


Doll

by theknightanon



Category: The Transformers (IDW Generation One)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Drift Whump, Drift/Ratchet/Rodimus possibility, Humiliation, Hurt/Eventual Comfort, M/M, Non-Consensual Body Modification, Objectification, Sexual Slavery, Size Kink, Torture
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-10-03
Updated: 2017-12-10
Packaged: 2019-01-08 10:37:00
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 13
Words: 22,874
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12252618
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/theknightanon/pseuds/theknightanon
Summary: Ultra Magnus says Rodimus can't fraternize with the crew. Expecting objections, he acquires a very fancy sex toy for Rodimus. Only problem is that the toy is Drift.





	1. a beginning

**Author's Note:**

> Um, yeah, wow. So, the premise of this story is that Deadlock is turned into a sex doll by Turmoil and then is later acquired by Rodimus, who has no idea he's sentient. So, needless to say, this story is not okay.

"You will not be having sexual congress with any members of the crew."

"What?" Rodimus said, staring at Ultra Magnus, transfixed. Ultra Magnus had just acknowledged the _existance_ of sex! This must be _gloriously embarrassing_ for him. Except...

"Magnus, we're going to be in space....indefinitely. There's no telling how long this quest is gonna take. And the only people around are the crew. By definition, everyone around is part of the crew."

Ultra Magnus sighed, folding his hands primly on the desk. "As the commanders of this ship, we hold are in a position of power over our fellow crewmembers. To enter into relations with a member of the crew would be unethical. For either of us."

Rodimus frowned, working over the material Mags had presented. He wasn't _wrong_ , but a little bit of workplace impropriety had never stopped Rod before. "Wait," he said, pointing at Magnus, "that doesn't apply to you. We're _both_ in command, we could frag."

Magnus did not look amused. "That is not going to happen. In any case, as captain, you're still in a position of authority over _me_ , your second in command. It would still be inappropriate."

"This isn't a military ship, Mags. We can make up our own rules." He didn't looked moved, so Rod moved onto wheedling. "I'll _die_ Magnus. I will overheat and _die_. Do you want to be promoted to captain after my untimely death? Is this a ploy to steal my ship?"

Ultra Magnus blinked at him. "I'll see what can be done," he said. He stood up and left. Apparently the briefing was over.

 

Ultra Magnus didn't mention it again. Rodimus got to thinking that maybe he'd forgotten. Especially in all the hustle and bustle of the launch and then the explosion and the sparkeater...that was enough to distract anyone.

Anyone except Ultra Magnus, apparently. Rodimus kicked at the box that had appeared in his habsuite. It was big and white and nearly as long as a berth, though not terribly tall. Atop it, affixed exactly two centimeters from the left edge, Magnus had attached a note: _for your interfacing problem_. Which mean, almost certainly, there was a sex toy in the box. Ultra Magnus had purchased a sex toy. For him. And had it delivered. To his habsuite. _Ultra Magnus_.

Rodimus didn't know how to cope with this information.

He decided, after an ample few seconds of reflection, that the only reasonable course of action was to unbox the thing and see what kinky slag _Ultra Magnus_ thought he was into. He brushed the note off the top and then struggled for a few minutes with the lid. Magnetic clasps on the sides. He found them eventually.

Inside there was a body.

"Primus, Magnus!" Rodimus said, retreating a few steps. "I'm not a necrophiliac. Priiiimus."

There was a datapad inside, resting on the bot's chest. Reaching in quickly, careful not to touch the body, Rodimus plucked it out. There was, as he'd expected, a message inside:

_Rodimus. Do not worry, this is not a dead body. While I was attempting to find a solution to your problem, I heard Prowl speaking of some equipment confiscated from the downed Decepticon cruisers. Apparently interfacing amongst crewmembers was not permitted on board Decepticon vessels, so to relieve charge they built 'frag dolls'. This is one such doll. Do not concern yourself with cleanliness - I had it disinfected, reframed and repainted before having it shipped to your office. While the dolls are built to look like people, they have only limited actions, all related to interfacing. I am sure you can discover them yourself without my assistance. The thing must be powered on via a switch at the back of the base of the skull._

_Please do not speak to me of this matter again._

_Duly Appointed Enforcer of the Tyrest Accord and Second in Command of the Starship Lost Light,_

_Ultra Magnus_

Okay, so not a person. Just a doll built to look like a person that some unknown number of Decepticons had fragged before it fell into Rodimus's hands. That was...well, it was obviously an improvement over Ultra Magnus thinking he was a necrophiliac, but not by much. _I do have standards. They may be low standards, but they do exist_. Nevertheless, he stepped closer to get a look at the thing.

If it _had_ been a potential berthmate...Rod would have said they were beautiful. Pointed finials jutting out of it's helm like a crown, framing a face with a delicate features and no faceplate. His frame was mostly white, with swirls of red that Rod couldn't help but notice matched his paint job perfectly. His eyes tracked over clean breastplate to narrow waistline, thin racing stripes drawing his eye. And then there were the legs, rounded and unlike any mech he'd ever seen. The red swirled in whorls over those huge hips - he let himself trace it with his fingertips. Gorgeous.

Nevertheless, he was definitely _not_ desperate enough to frag some inanimate object, even if it looked like a Primus-sent speedster hottie. But he couldn't just return it - they were literally lost in space. And leaving it in the original packaging felt wrong. It was too much like a coffin. Rod looked around the habsuite. He could sit it in the chair by the desk. He wasn't going to use the desk anyway, he had one in his office. That'd be less creepy than the coffin-like box.

He reached into the box and levered the bot into a sitting position. He expected it to immediately flop back, but the position held. _Cool. So it's posable?_ Bending the knees in, he lifted the doll up in his arms. It was heavier than he'd expected, but he'd carried actual berthmates about the room before. No biggie. He stepped carefully over to the desk and posed the bot in the chair. _Okay, that's actually more creepy._ Now it looked like the doll was some stranger who'd kicked it while doing paperwork in his habsuite. A gorgeous, alluring, dead stranger.

"Geeze, Mags. How am I supposed to sleep with this thing _watching_ me?" Rod said, patting it on the shoulder. "Sorry, Doll. You're just a little unsettling." Curiously, his hand crept round to the back of the neck and felt out the power switch Magnus's note had mentioned. _Just a quick check to see what capabilities it has. Not going to actually do anything._ He flicked the switch.

Blue optics flickered to life, well, not to life exactly. But they came on. Other than that, there was no movement from the doll. "Hmm, what a box of mysteries we've got here," Rod murmured. "What do I have to do to make you do something?" His fingertips brushed over it's face, lingering on the lips. Curious, he pushed gently. The mouth opened slowly, revealing a red glossa and gummy red caps where the denta should have been. Rod felt around the soft red plastic, the transition where it met gumline. "Huh, why would you not put in normal denta? Seems to kill the 'lifelike' effect." He reached in with a second hand to try prying at the red plastic, the mouth opening wider to admit hhim. With a pop, the casing came off, revealing a wicked set of Decepticon-style fangs.

Rod tapped at the fangs with a fingertip. _Damned sharp._ "Some of those Decepticons must have been _kinky_. Let's put this back on." He wrestled with the mouthguard for a bit, fingers slippery with artificial oral lubricants. One of his hands slipped off and bumped against the doll's glossa. To Rod's fascination, the glossa instantly wrapped itself around his fingers, lapping and applying a gentle suction. "Slag." That was _shockingly_ lifelike.

He got the cap back on and pulled his hands out, wiping them off on the doll's chestplate. Further investigations...he knelt down real quick to see what kind of equipment the thing was packing. He ran his fingers around the lines that marked the panel, feeling for a release. It slid back after a few moments of scrabbling, parting to reveal a pure white valve, red external node plump at the top of the slit. Rod sat back on his heels, frowning. "No spike?" Decepticons were less kinky than he'd figured after all. Where there ought to have been the secondary spike paneling, hiding the unpressurized spike, there was only smooth plating. Rod ran his hand over the smooth expanse, slightly disconcerted. Yeah, some bots didn't want a spike and hadn't gotten that mod put in. But they were, like, one in ten of the actively interfacing sort of bots that Rod tended to encounter in...intimate circumstances. And it's not like he was _disappointed_ , he wasn't going to frag the thing anyway. At least this proved that Ultra Magnus hadn't snooped through his vidfile history while picking out the doll. Rod had been a trifle alarmed when those thighs had stood out like a bot straight out of his dirtiest fantasies.

With a finger, he probed at the doll's valve, just to check out how lifelike they'd managed to make it. The inside was smooth and velvety, already weeping slightly with lubricants. Not a very _tidy_ toy, considering it came courtesy of Ultra Magnus. He'd have to figure out where to refill the lubricant reserves on this thing. He wiggled his finger around a bit, but found no cling. Frowning, he pushed two more fingers in. The walls of the valve touched him, but there was no pressure from the calipers there'd have been a real valve. Huh. He pulled his fingers out and wiped them off on the dolls leg, considering the possibilities. Either it didn't have that functionality, or somebody who'd used it in the past had been so big they'd stretched the calipers out beyond functioning. That was the sort of thing he could have asked Ratchet for help with, if it had been a problem with him and not an incredibly embarrassing sex doll.

He stood up, feeling a bit hot, charge stinging through him. Not his fault, how was he supposed to think about interfacing without _thinking about interfacing_? There was one feature that he could maybe try out...he crept his fingers over the chest plate of the doll, looking for the cover on the receiving plug. Some bots weren't into plug and play interfacing, but Rod was up for most anything. He found it and sighed when he realized that, of course, the doll would only have a plug, no cable. Felt weird not to do that mutually, he thought as he unspooled his own cable and plugged it in. With a shudder of concentration, he poured as much of his spare charge as he could down the cabling, bracing himself on the back of the chair as he leaned over the doll.

The charge visibly crackled, sparking at the optics and then over the surface of the frame as the doll arched in perfect imitation of an overload. Except for the still face and frozen, posed limbs he could have been convinced. The charge continued to crackle for a few moments, then dissipated, leaving the doll limp again. Red unplugged and respooled his cable, panting with exertion. Primus be damned. He'd needed that. Snapping the plug cover closed, he resettled the doll back in a more neutral posture.

"Okay," he said, aware he was speaking to an inanimate object. "I'm impressed. Still, not desperate enough to frag a doll."

He powered it down and turned to exit the habsuite for the bridge. There was probably work to be done. Important, captain-y work. He should go do that.


	2. Rod slips up

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> a note, to manage expectations: this is the first smut the writer has ever writ. Kinda diving into the deep end with this story.
> 
> oh, also, we're switching to Drift's perspective for the smutty chapters.

The red bot stumbled into the room, slapping at the light controls as he went. "Kay, little bit tipsy," he muttered as he missed the controls the first two times. He sashayed over to Drift and draped himself over his lap. "Hey, Doll. You would not believe the day I've been having," he said, flicking the power switch and allowing Drift's optics to power on.

Rodimus turned to reposition himself, spreading his thighs over Drift's. He began absently grinding his interface plate against Drift's as he spoke. "So I go to Swerve's and there are three couples snogging in the bar. I'm being tormented, I swear. Everyone has heard that Magnus said I'm 'not allowed to fraternize with the crew'," he said in an overdone caricature of Magnus's voice. "Everybody knows somehow and they're tormenting me. I've been so revved up all night, doll."

He ground his plating against Drift, already burning hot. He looped his arms around Drift's neck to steady himself. "I know I said I wasn't gonna, but just this once. Just this once."

Rodimus leaned close and used his teeth to pull Drift's cable cover open, With an unsteady hand, he wrangled his own cover open and hooked them up. Drift could already feel the incipient charge, dancing at his port. Rodimus released his own interface panel, spike popping free and instantly pressurizing. Rod pulled himself close to Drift, capturing his spike between their bodies.

"Primus, yes," Rod muttered, rocking into the friction as his spike spread lubricant onto Drift's plating. Squeezing tight with his arms, Rodimus leaned over to suckle at Drift's neck. His words were muffled and wet. "Damn good fragtoy," he said as he licked into Drift's cabling. Drift felt his frame stiffen. First overload teetering on the edge between the pressure Rod was putting on his valve plating, the mouth on his neck and the dancing charge pulsing over the interface cabling.

"Primus, they even built it to have a good time," Rod mouthed into his neck. "Frag, yeah." He thrust faster, spike bouncing between their bodies as his charge cycled higher.

Drift broke first, humiliation rushing him as his frame locked up in overload, his optics sparking. Lubricant oozed out of his closed panel to pool beneath his legs. Rodimus tripped into overload after him.

He tipped the chair over too, sending them crashing to the ground as he painted Drift's frame in transfluid and dumped charge over the cable. Drift's frame convulsed. Paralyzed limbs snapping about as Rodimus dragged out his overload, undulating against Drift. He slowed and then stilled and then started laughing. A mite hysterically, Drift thought.

"What even..." Rodimus muttered. "Not a tidy toy at all. Now we're both a mess." He ran his finger up Drift's abdomen and brought it up to his lips, dripping with luminescent transfluid. Rodimus pushed at his lips and his mouth opened itself, letting him in.

Drift lapped at the presented fingers, sucking them dry. The fluid was spicy on his tongue, like an electric shock to the glossa. Keeping those fingers in his mouth to keep it open, Rodimus swept his other hand through the mess on Drift's stomach and pushed it into his mouth, the excess dribbling over and dripping down his chin. Drift swallowed furiously, trying to keep his intake clear. "Nevermind, Rodimus said, "you're a tidy toy after all. What a good fragtoy you are." He brought up his fingers covered in Drift's own lubricant and pushed them into his mouth. "Look at you, so eager to take whatever I give you. Drink up, Doll. We're going to get nice and clean."


	3. getting some paperwork done

"You will not believe this, Doll," Rodimus said. He bumped the door control with his aft, arms full of datapads. "Magnus claims I've not been doing my paperwork. Can you believe it?" He staggered over to the desk and dumped the pile of datapads on it in a loose, rapidly disintegrating pyramid. Grumbling, he turned on his heel to pick up the few that had fallen to the floor and dropped them on the desk as well. "He claims I've just been hiding every datapad I'm given that requires my signature 'in my office' and that they have to be 'done by next shift'. I said, if he wanted them done so badly, he should do them himself."

Rodimus paused significantly, then shrugged. "Yeah, didn't work. What can I say, it was a nice try. Hey, Doll, do you think the fact that I spend so much time talking to you means there's something wrong with me?"

Drift sat there, frozen, straining to see Rodimus's little pout from behind unlit optics. _You're lonely,_ he thought. _Anyone could see that._

"Oh well. So, I had a thought on my way over, which was that maybe, if we worked together, I could motivate myself to make it through this paperwork. Whattaya think, Doll?" Rodimus reached over and, cupping Drift's helm between his hands, nodded his head. "Cool. You're such a great sport, Doll." With a casual flick of his finger, he switched Drift's optics on.

"Okay, first off, I'm going to need this chair," Rodimus said." He pushed Drift forward, off of the chair. Drift's legs folded beneath him as his helm rebounded off the desk. "Oh, slag. Sorry, Doll," Rod said, sliding on the chair and tilting Drift's head back to inspect his helm, rubbing his hands over it to check for dents. "No damage, we're okay. That's a relief, I've been wanting to do this for a long time. Keep a secret? I've been wanting to do this ever since I first pushed my fingers in your mouth."

Rodimus repositioned Drift, turning him around so he was kneeling mostly under the desk, facing towards Rod. Then he scooted forwards on his chair to drape his legs over Drift's shoulders. With a rough hand, he rubbed at his interface paneling until it retracted. Spike springing free and then bobbing lazily at eye level. Drift hadn't gotten to see it last time.

Rod was bigger than he should have been for a frame that size, a mod out of egoism perhaps? His spike was, unbelievably, flame-red, with little gold flame decals painted up the sides. There was even a line of red biolighting running alongside the flames, strobing from base to head.

"Prettiest damn spike in the galaxy," Rod said, petting at Drift's helm. "I had it painted in a mod shop, after the war. You're the first pers-" he paused. "Well, nobody's gotten to see it yet, but they're gonna be real damn impressed when they do. When I overload the lights change colors. Fragging work of art."

His gaze wandered to the ungainly pile of datapads on his desk and he sighed. "Okay. Motivation time. As long as I'm working, I get to have your mouth, Doll."

He gripped Drift by the back of the helm and guided his lips up to that absurd red spike. He let it rest against Drift's lips, picking up a datapad with his free hand and thumbing it on. Then he crossed his legs behind Drift's shoulders and pushed. His spike slowly filled Drift's mouth, forcing his jaw open at an exaggerated angle. Rodimus stopped with his spike halfway inside, just nudging against the back of Drift's glossa.

He used his finger to swipe to the next page on the datapad. He looked over that page and swiped again. Oral lubricant began to drip out the corners of Drift's mouth, tracking down his chin. Rodimus swiped to the next page.

Drift sucked ineffectually on the spike. Once there was that much spike in your mouth, there wasn't much you could actually do with your glossa. But he tried, laving at the underside of the spike with the flat of his glossa. Licking little circles with the point of his glossa along the seams. More lubricant dripped over his lips, mixing now with the first drops of transfluid. Rodimus sighed.

"Oh, Doll," he said, looking away from the datapad for a moment and looking over Drift. "You are perfect. Can't believe I spent so much time hung up on what you couldn't do because you weren't a person. Sure, you're a lot more passive than I like in a partner. And I like my partners _vocal_. But I've never gotten to share this kink with a frag buddy - don't want to scare 'em off. Gonna keep you there storing my spike all night. Like that's what you're for. This _is_ what you're for."

He gripped at Drift's helm possessively and turned back to his datapad. He read through that datapad and then discarded it, tossing it off to the side. Drift's hopes lifted for a moment, but he just picked up the next pad and flicked it on. Absent-mindedly, he began to pet along the edges of Drift's finials, locked knees holding his head in place. They went on for an interminable amount of time like that before Rod finished that datapad as well. He signed it with a flourish with his fingertip and set it aside.

A puddle of oral lubricant was gathering around Drift's knees from where it dripped off his chin. Rodimus paused to look him over before he took up his next pad. "Just look at you. Such a pretty spike-sleeve. So handsome." He dropped his hand to grip drift by the finials, rubbing little circles on them. "Can't think of any prettier place to keep my spike and you feel so soft and wet for me. Okay, one overload. Just one. Then back to paperwork."

That was all the warning Drift got before Rod jammed his spike into his intake. Hands crushing against his finials, using them as handles to pump his spike in and out of Drift's intake. Drift's intake contracted against the intrusion, tightening around Rod's spike. He moaned and thrust harder. Drift's lips bumped against the base of Rod's panel with bruising force.

"Frag, yes," Rod muttered around another moan.

Drift could feel the indentations of the biolights running over his tongue as Rodimus rutted into his intake. His throat wasn't wide enough to fit his spike, the mesh stretched around it trying to push the spike out as Rod shoved it in. His finials felt red hot, sensor net lighting up as Rod shoved at them like handles.

With a startled yelp, Rodimus pulled Drift onto his spike, burying it deep in his intake as he overloaded in hot pulses. The charge nipped at Drift's lips as his throat writhed against the spike. Rodimus curled over him, shivering.

The overload broke and Rodimus pushed Drift away. The spike slipped out of his lips, leaving a trail of transfluid on Drift's face. Rodimus panted, hands gripping the edge of the table.

"Woah," Rodimus said. "Woah. That was incredible."

Drift's intake burned and his finials ached. His knees complained at him in insistent pings of ignored soreness. Transfluid tripped off his cheekbones and over his bruised lips.

Rodimus reached out a finger to trace over those lips, slightly puffy. "Maybe I overdid that, just a little," Rod said. "In my defense, you're the best fragtoy I've ever had the privilege of stretching out. That felt incredible. Primus, I've got to do that again." He looked over at the pile of datapads with a wheezy sigh. "Not till you're done your required reading, Rodimus."

He scooted forwards on his chair again, lifting his legs up to rest his feet on the table as he reached for the next datapad. Drift knelt and waited. Rodimus powered the datapad on and read, propping it up against one of his thighs as he gentled his spike in soft little stokes. He signed something at the end and dropped the pad onto the stack of finished ones.

He grabbed for the next one and propped it in the same position. Keeping his eyes fixed on the pad, he leaned over to Drift with his free hand and grasped the crest of his helm. He pulled Drift higher on his knees until he was teetering, off balance, lips poised above Rod's spike. Moving one hand to the back of Drift's head and the other to steady the head of his spike, he began to push Drift back down.

 _At least from here it's going to bump against the roof of my mouth. It'd have to bend to-_ inexorably, Rod continued to push his head downwards. The segments of the spike jostled and curved. The head ground against the start of his intake and then eased inside. Rodimus kept pushing until Drift was kissing the base of his spike housing, fat spike distending the top of his intake. He rested a proprietary hand on the back of Drift's head, applying gentle pressure as he turned his attention back to his datapad.

Drift whined piteously. The signal sang out, propagating down his his mangled vocoder and then echoed back to him. _You don't get to speak anymore._ His jaw jammed open, his glossa dripping solvent in drabs onto Rodimus's plating as he held himself on Rod's spike.

Time slowed. He watched the light shift on Rodimus's plating. He counted the datapads dropped onto the growing pile beside the chair. Sometimes Rod would make little abortive thrusts into his mouth, but he always stilled himself. Petting at Drift's helm and muttering to himself, "Not yet. Need to finish these." Drift's intake refused to relax, still spasming against the intrusion even as the mesh ached from overuse.

Finally, Rod reached up onto the desk for a new datapad and came back with nothing. He made a questioning hum. He leaned over as he checked the desk, jostling Drift as he shifted. Then Rod punched the air. "Mission accomplished!" He crowed. "Excellent work, Rodimus Prime. You're a real responsible guy. You just needed a little...encouragement."

His hands dropped to Drift's helm, then floated down to his neck. Reverently, he pressed his fingers to the top of Drift's neck, feeling out the distended intake hidden behind the cables. "My perfect little fragtoy. Primus. Nothing has ever felt so right. If I could do this every night..." Hands on Drift's finials, he pulled his spike free. He shook his legs a bit as he stood up, loosening up the kinks from sitting at a desk so long. He rolled his shoulders and swung his arms a bit, humming. He made no move to retract his spike as he pushed the chair away from the desk.

"Okay. We did it, Rod. Reward time," he said, leaning down to take Drift under the armpits and drag him out from under the desk. He dragged them to the berth, then picked Drift up to lay him on his back on the berth. Still humming cheerfully, Rod adjusted Drift until he was laying with his head hanging off the side of the berth. "I've always wanted to try out spike worship," Rod said to Drift. "But you say, 'I want you to choke on my spike all evening and then suckle it in your sleep until I say you can stop' and berthmates tend to run. And if they weren't _really_ into it, I couldn't be into it, you know, Doll? I don't want to be with someone who isn't having a nice time."

On that note, he squeezed at Drift's cheeks, popping his mouth open. Rod clamped his hands over Drift's shoulders, preventing him from sliding down the berth as he returned his spike to it's home. Upside down, the path from Drift's lips to his intake was shorter. But Rod just sat there, nudging at the entrance for a minute, rocking gently back and forth. Bouncing on the balls of his pedes.

Then he snarled, "Choke on it, spike-sleeve," thrusting in all at once. Drift slid down the berth with the force of it. Rod yanked him back to the edge, pushing down harder on his shoulders as he set a punishing rhythm. After a few thrusts, he moved one of his arms off Drift's shoulder to push down across Drift's neck. He slammed in and pushed, arm narrowing Drift's intake and heightening the pressure on his spike. Drift could tell that was the case because he could hear him babbling about the pressure and how good and prefect it was. He hung, limp, as Rod pounded into him. Losing rhythm as his moans became dirty invocations to "Choke, fragtoy. You can't, can you? Perfect for this. Too perfect for this. You were built to take my spike. Frag, fag, Doll, so tight I-"

He overloaded again, charge jumping from his frame to Drift's. His spike pumped transfluid down his throat in undulating pulses against Drift's strained intake. Rodimus slapped at the berth and groaned as the contorting, struggling mesh of Drift's intake dragged out his overload. Eventually, the pulses slowed and then stopped and the crackling of their frames dissipated. Drift felt woozily full, tanks unable to settle when filled laying down. Everything hurt. Rodimus pulled his spike free slowly, groping at Drift's neck to feel it exit his intake. "So perfect, Doll."

When Rodimus finally pulled free, he slumped to sit down next to the berth, venting heavily. Drift felt his processor urging him to run his fans and open vents, command of which were no longer in his control. He was steaming inside, but, from experience, he knew it wasn't a dangerous level of charge. Even if Rodimus was the horniest bot in the galaxy, he was unlikely to overheat Drift on his lonesome.

"Well, we made a mess," Rodimus gasped out. "Hope you're hungry, doll." He sprawled his arm over Drift's abdomen, rubbing in circles at his fuel tank. "That was amazing. I need to let loose more often, eh?"


	4. fantasies

"If only I could take you with me everywhere."

"Think of it? Everyone staring at us while I sit on the captain's chair. Sailing us through space with your head between my legs. Your perfect mouth right where it belongs, round my spike. On the bridge I'd just let you warm it, most of the time. Just a nice warm place to keep my spike."

"And you'd be so beautiful, so pretty, everyone would be jealous. They'd all see my gorgeous fragtoy and they'd want a piece of you for _themselves_. Ultra Magnus? He'd be there, just watching you taking my spike, and he'd wish he'd taken a little sample before sending you over to me. I'd have crewmembers trying to talk to me on the bridge all the time, just to get a glimpse of you sucking spike."

"And, I mean, who could blame them? You're perfect. Those finials, just the right size to hang on to. Your white frame would turn heads - first you notice how clean it is, then you can't help imagining it _dirty._ Your interface paneling is so prominent and that red's a real head-turner. Everyone's gotta be thinking about fragging the moment they see you. Those hips, those thighs - no real mech has ever looked like you do and you look _delicious_. Those perfect plush lips, stretched wide around my spike? You're gorgeous, Doll."

"So I'd just keep you there, on the bridge. And in meetings too. You could sit there under the table, keeping my attention up while Magnus and Perceptor and all them try to tell me their reports. Now, eventually, they might want to sample the goods."

"I mean, I wouldn't let them. Not really, But this is just a fantasy. So let's see...Me, Magnus, Perceptor, Brainstorm and Blaster are all in a meeting. Plotting our course from the Matrix map. I get you kneeling at the head of the table, chin propped up on the table. Brainstorm's there, so I'd ask for his help. We'd get a chain around your neck, looping under those delicate little neck cables, keeping you from sliding too far back from the chair. So, before the meeting starts I show you off a bit. I let 'em touch. Just to see Magnus cradling that gorgeous aft of yours in his enormous hand, rubbing you up and down. We'd joke a bit and I'd suggest he could try spanking you. He'd get all shy and blushy, but we'd goad him into it, me and Brainstorm. You'd already be chained to the chair at that point."

"He'd lay that enormous hand over your aft. Just the one hand. He could cover you from hip to hip, palm to fingertip. And he'd squeeze, squeezing that perfect aft till it blushed hot pink, just to warm you up. He'd draw his hand back and we'd all encourage him to windup further and further back. Me and Blaster would brace the chair cuz, when Magnus hits things? They tend to go flying. When he finally hit you, it'd sound like a bell. Your body would snap forward like a rag doll and crush your neck against the chair. Me and Blaster might skid back a few inches. We'd tell him to do it again.”

“He'd work up a rhythm. Absolutely destroying your aft. Then working up and down those gorgeous thighs. You're built so sensitive, I bet it wouldn't take more than one hit before you'd be leaking onto the floor. Magnus wouldn't stop till we told him too, once your plating was dented and chipped and your aft was glowing."

"Then, just for fun, we'd flip you over. Still chained down, but we'd tip your head back to lay on the chair. Percy and Brainstorm would spread your legs for Magnus. I'd get your paneling open. The controls are a little finnicky for fingers so big they could fill your valve in one go. And we'd just all look at you for a bit. So damn pretty, all spread out on the floor, ours for the taking. And Magnus would run his hands up and down the front of those round thighs. He'd kneel down between your legs and Percy and Brainstorm would have to spread your legs even wider to make it work. And then he'd get to work on your front, laying spank after spank on those perfect thighs until you were pink all way round."

"Next he'd lay that hand over your valve, just to feel it pulse under his fingertips. And he'd wind up, all the way up, like there was a Decepticon that needed to be sent to the afterspark. And right there. Right on your external node. He'd spank you so hard you'd overload on the spot. You'd be boneless with pleasure and we'd rearrange the furniture and get you right ways up and start the meeting with my spike in your lax mouth. You'd be so staticky after that overload you wouldn't even do anything distracting with your tongue. You'd just hold me."

"Maybe, I dunno, halfway though the meeting? We'd switch seats. Percy could take the hotseat next. He's a real efficient guy. He'd get seated in your mouth for a few seconds and then he'd start thrusting. Still giving his presentation. Lots of math-y science words as he revs his fans and frags your mouth as hard as I am. But perfectly precise. Same depth, same timing, every time. He comes in, maybe a minute. Very efficient guy."

"He cedes the seat to Blaster. He'd be giving a report on the progress repairing the subspace-communicator array. Blaster, he's a sensitive guy. So he wouldn't dive in with his spike. Nah. He'd open up his array and guide your pretty lips to his external node. Get his finger in there to pop your mouth open and then push you on till it suctions. And then, we all know you. When you've got something in your mouth, you suck it. You're a sexy little sucking machine."

"And he'd be petting your helm and trying to hide all those cute little moaning noises he makes as you go to town on his node. He'd be rocking in his seat, little twitches, like we weren't all watching him frag a doll at an officer's meeting. And he'd be grinding into your face, your face would be absolutely _dripping_ with him. And when he slipped over the edge, his hands would slip and he'd pull you further down his array and your glossa could slip into his valve. And you'd just keep licking at him, licking and sucking at his valve while he can't stop overloading."

"By this point, I figure Brainstorm probably has _ideas_ for his turn. He's just like that. He's probably been building something this whole time. I dunno what. Mm...let's say it's a nice spreader gag, but he's built it to vibrate. Brainstorm could totally build that while attending a meeting. So he saunters over there, cocky as Primus himself, and pops that baby in your mouth. It holds you nice and open so your mouth doesn't close when he pulls out. He turns on the vibration and it rattles you right down to your overly sharp denta. Then, cause he's totally obsessed with Percy, he starts making eye contact with Brainstorm while giving you the slowest, showiest frag ever. Just rolling his hips into that vibrating ring nice and slow, talking a mile a minute while he frags your mouth like he wants Percy to do him. Probably doesn't last very long, cause he's busy mooning after Percy."

"And that leaves...Magnus again. Now, I figure Magnus would refuse while the meeting was going on. He's a professional sort of guy. But afterwards, we get him in the chair and get a look at the _ultra_ spike. It's...mm, well, it's gotta be big. Poor Mags is gonna claim it won't fit down your intake. I mean, two of his fingers are the size of my spike, if that thing's proportional...but let's just say for the sake of the fantasy your throat is real stretchy. So Magnus unsheathes his killer spike, but we have to uncuff you from the chair to get your lips around that thing. Magnus takes your helm by the finials and guides just the head of his spike into your mouth. Your lips stretch obscenely around it. Your jaw unhinges so far we might have to take you to Ratchet after. And Magnus pushes in, pulling you in farther and farther until your intake is stretched around that nice, fat spike."

"And he just sits there, spike halfway down your neck. And it's fraggin hot so I don't say anything right away. But eventually I ask if something's wrong and he says that you're so tight, so tight around his spike that he can't get any leverage. So he goes down onto his knees, spike still impaling your throat, and he frags you against the floor. And you're bouncing around like a child's toy on his spike, just bouncing up and down as he rips that spike out of your throat and slams it home again. When Magnus finally overloads, he pumps you so full of transfluid that your plating domes around it. We end that meeting in a blaze of ozone and enough leaked lubricant that it looks like a crime scene."

"Frag yeah. If I could bring you everywhere I'd never have to lose this," Rodimus said, driving back into Drift's throat.

He'd raised up Drift's head with a few boxes. All the better to kneel over his face and feed his spike into his intake. Hands achingly tight on Drift's finials as he drove into his intake. Drift lay on the berth, body shaking with the force of Rod's thrusts as Rod waxed philosophic about his latest fantasies. This had been going...awhile. He was hoping that the overload Rod was chasing was to be his last for the night. Already, his fuel tank had swelled uncomfortably and his intake felt rubbed raw. Circulation to his arms gave intermittent pings of distress with Rod digging his knees into his shoulders.

Rodimus adjusted his hands to swipe a line of drool off his face. Then he moved to position his hands around Drift's neck, digging his fingers into the cabling. He squeezed and began to pound into Drift with renewed vigor, moaning as he felt his own spike sliding under his hands. Choking on a moan, he squeezed tighter and overloaded into Drift's constricted throat.

He collapsed over Drift, panting and venting with his fans on high. Spike still lodged in Drift's throat and feebly spasming. Drift's tank roiled in protest.

Above him somewhere, a comm chimed. Rodimus cursed. He pulled of Drift with a squelch and rolled around on the berth, hunting for his discarded commlink. He must have found it, because a tiny voice distantly started yelling something.

"Sorry! I know, I'll be there in...a few minutes," Rodimus said, climbing off the berth with a wobble in his step. "Yeah, I was doing some laps and lost track of time. Sorry. See you in a bit-"

He tossed the commlink back on the berth, where it rebounded off Drift's leg. "Slag. Okay. I'll clean up and we'll deal with all this," Rod gestured at Drift's whole figure, the berth and the assorted bodily fluids that had leaked everywhere, "later. Gotta run."

Drift watched as Rod bolted for the attached washracks, then bolted back out a few minutes later. Rod jammed the lights, sending the room into darkness as he exited the room. Drift lay there. In the darkness he could see the blue blur of his optics reflecting off the ceiling. He could feel the fluids on his stomach slowly cooling and congealing as he waited. And waited.

And waited.


	5. tryptich

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Three short scenes to move our plot along a bit.

Rodimus clung to him. Frame shaking. Head pressed against the back of his neck as sobs rattled his body.

When he came back to the room, the only thing he said was, "I messed up, Doll." And then he'd collapsed onto the berth, pulled Drift into his embrace and broken down.

Drift wished he was facing Rodimus. He wanted to see that he was okay, that he wasn't hurt. Surely the crew wouldn't have let their captain retreat back to his room if he was hurt? Whatever had gone wrong, it hadn't caused a disturbance in the captain's habsuite. It had been a quiet day of sitting and waiting up until Rodimus shambled in.

Eventually the shaking subsided. "I made the wrong call," Rodimus whispered into Drift's neck. "I fragged up and Rong is-he doesn't even have a head anymore!"

Rodimus rolled Drift over to lie on his back, then crawled to drape himself over him. Still hugging him like a scared sparkling as he hid his face against Drift's chestplate. But he didn't look hurt. He looked whole.

"I have to give a speech to the crew. What am I even supposed to say?" Rodimus moaned. "Ratchet and the rest are all in surgery, we don't know if he's even going to make it. I shouldn't have let Fort Max wander around armed. I shouldn't have ordered Swerve to take the shot. Doll, what am I supposed to do now?" He snuffled against Drift's chest, wiping away tears.

"I wish you could talk, sometimes," Rodimus said. "I wish you could talk and give me advice. I can't ask anyone here for help. They're all relying on _me_ to know what I'm doing and I have...no idea what I'm doing. Are the Knights even real? What if I've gotten us stranded in space, gotten crewmembers killed just to chase after a fantasy? They think I know what I'm doing and I just let them think that. I'm lying to all of them. I'm a bad person, Doll. I'm a bad person."

_I've met bad people, Rodimus Prime. You're not bad people. You're just...lonely. And you've been pushed into a position of authority you don't have the skills to handle. It's bad form, giving a soldier a command that he doesn't have the experience to lead well. That's how you kill promising leaders._

Drift's arms itched to pull the speedster tight. He supposed that maybe he should hate Rodimus. _But he doesn't know what he's doing. He's not hurting me out of malice, he's hurting me out of ignorance. Probably in less painful ways than he would if he had me here as a person, a captured Decepticon assassin in the clutches of an Autobot ship._

Rodimus pulled himself together after a few more minutes. He propped Drift back up in a sitting position against the headboard of the berth. "Okay. Okay. I've gotta do this. Doll, you'll be my audience." He swung himself off the berth and paced around, delivering snatches of a speech on the bravery of somebot, a little therapist who'd survived four million years of war. Who'd outlasted almost every other therapist and kept on going, never complained as the number of people needing his help rose higher and higher.

"It's easy to think it was us doing the fighting that won the war," Rodimus said. "But that would never have been possible without the bravery of bots like Rang. It's comforting to think that the war was won by soldiers, because then we don't have to think about the unnumbered noncombatants, dead-"

_Won._

_The._

_War._

 

* * *

 

"It's just a different sort of feeling, you know, Doll?" Rodimus said, panting. He had one hand digging into the transformation seams around his hip, the cable he had jacked into Drift's port singing with charge. "I mean, I love a interfacing frag as much as anyone. But that sort of overload is like someone zapping you in the spark. It just builds and builds and then boom! You're flat on your back and feeling like someone took one of those shock sticks to your insides. In a good way, obviously. But a good tactile overload, it's just got a different character. More like floating in an oil bath when someone tosses a sparker grenade in. It just surrounds you and consumes you, a full body experience."

He let his other hand trail up his abdomen, fingering at the edges of his biolights. His spike was out and untouched, trembling with tension. His valve exposed and leaking, lubricants puddling out on the berth. Rodimus moaned and sent a burst of charge over the cabling. He lifted his hands away from his plating, shivering all over. "Close one there."

They'd been playing this game most of the afternoon. Rodimus edging himself closer and closer to an overload, then sending the charge over to Drift to keep himself dangling right on that knife's edge. Drift was so charged up his optics flared white-hot with each new burst of charge. He tripped into another overload, frame rattling against the berth. Rodimus reached a hand over, letting the sparks leap off Drift's frame to his outstretched fingers. "Just look at you, Doll. So fraggin pretty."

He touched his hand to Drift's frame, judging the temperature. When Drift had started to grow too hot earlier, Rod had taken a break to rub cooling oil over his frame. Like you would an invalid with malfunctioning ventilation system. It had been heavenly. But apparently he judged Drift not _too_ hot for safety, because he rolled back onto his back and brought his hands to his frame again. Rubbing his hands over and under the flame-emblazoned chestplate as he undulated against the berth, bridging his back up to expose his abdomen even more.

"Ufh, Doll, if you weren't here, I don't know what I'd do. Well, I'd probably find some member of the crew to frag on the side, I guess. I just run so hot, can't imagine not being able to do this." He pushed another burst of charge at Drift with a sigh. "I mean, I can literally light myself on fire when I run too hot. Fragging is, like, a medical necessity."

Rod's eyes blanked for a second as he checked his HUD. "Wow, we've still got another hour before I have to get to that meeting. Guess I better stretch this out."

 

* * *

 

 

"And then I said, Brainstorm, go ahead. Shrink the Titan. 'Cuz if we were all going to die, we might as well all die doing the right thing. And then, somehow, doing that allowed the Titan to teleport all of us _and_ the Titan to safety. Absolutely unbelieveable."

Rodimus petted at Drift's helm, nestled safely between his legs. "Thought I might not get to see your pretty face again, for a minute there. Well, thought I wouldn't get to see anyone's face ever again, for a minute there. But yours is the prettiest." He leaned over to plant a kiss on the top of Drift's helm.

"Mm, so I suppose I should actually work up that report for Magnus," Rodimus said. Keeping one hand on the back of Drift's helm, he reached for a datapad on his desk. "Getting Brainstorm to program me up some voice to speech on these things was a great idea. The thoughts just flow so much better when you're talking, you know what I mean, Doll?" He punctuated the name with a particularly hard thrust.

"You know, Magnus thinks I'm being _mighty_ productive and captain-y lately. I haven't told him my secret. Wouldn't want him requesting a sample. I mean, he might stretch our your throat the way some idiot already ruined your valve. And then I wouldn't be able to have any fun at all."

"Mm, okay. Start recording. Captain's Log. This is Captain Rodimus of the starship Lost Light, once Prime of the planet Cybertron. This is a record of events that happened after Tailgate's Act of Affiliation. We were contacted by a ship of fleshlings. Organic sorts, the unfriendly kind that work for the Galactic Council. They were the crew of the frankly ludicrously sized 'peacekeeping vessel'...hmm, I've forgotten the name. I'm sure you know that, Mags. Anyway, they used a teleporter to teleport the crew present for Tailgate's ceremony onto the surface of-"


	6. bathtime

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Drift's not having a very good day.

The captain's quarters had a full attached washracks. Drift hadn't gotten to see the inside of them before, but he was pleasantly surprised with how tidy they were. It wasn't that Rodimus was a slob - he just tended to leave things lying about.

The washracks were certainly spacious. A central bench, several sprayers hanging from the walls. A cabinet of waxing and polishing supplies next to a walk-in wax warmer. Rodimus had come back to the habsuite in high spirits, apparently feeling driven to clean the whole hab, Drift included. He'd carried Drift into the washracks and left him laying on the bench while he scrubbed down the habsuite proper. A few times he popped into the room to grab supplies, humming a low tune under his breath.

Drift let his mind wander. Not inwards, that was dangerous. Instead, he explored the dream he'd woken from a few days prior. He'd been wandering a darkened hall on Cybertron, surrounded by glowing spheres of light. He needed to find someone, but he didn't know who. Two shadows walked at his shoulders, guiding him through the crowd. They led him to a table where two strangers had explained the design specs of a starship to him. They spoke only in Hand. He had known before they even spoke that _this_ was the _one_. He woke up and began to piece the little bits of what he remembered to the details about the Lost Light Rodimus had talked about. 250 rooms, capable of holding 500 crewmembers. Impulse fuel engines fed by reserves held in the fuel quills. A jump ship with a quantum engine. Just the most recent of a series of strange dreams. In them he went places he'd never been, and heard voices speaking to him, telling him about people he'd never known. Dreams were supposed to just be reprocessing of the information you already knew. So how did he continue to dream of Crystal City and the Knights of Cybertron? He'd done so even before Rodimus had spoken of them for the first time.

Rodimus interrupted his thoughts by appearing back in the doorway. "Well, I guess you're up next, Sexy," Rodimus said, rubbing his hands together. He wandered over to the row of sprayers and selected one, adjusting a dial at the wall. "Rinse off first."

The solvent spray blasted like a power washed. Rodimus wandered over, hosing down Drift's prone body with a disinterested eye. Drift's flinch reflexes activated and then wouldn't stop, but his body stayed fast, ignoring him. Rodimus lifted Drift into a seated posture so he could hose off his back, then let him drop back to the bench. He lifted Drift's legs up to his chest, spraying down the back of his legs. Then Rodimus climbed onto the bench between Drift's splayed legs, holding the sprayer under his arm as he opened Drift's panel. It slid aside smoothly, belying Drift's internal terror.

"Since your glossa can't reach down here, guess I'll have to clean you up," Rodimus said as he turned the full-power sprayer onto Drift's valve. The spray flailed Drift's external node, sending it instantly into overdrive as it pulsed and throbbed at the pressure. Rod must have noticed some physical change, because he huffed a laugh. "Bit eager, aren't we?" He said, rubbing over Drift's node with his thumb. Then he moved the head of the sprayer right up to the entrance of Drift's valve, spreading his valve rim to dircet more of the spray inside. Drift's valve, practically untouched recently, shot sparks of panic up to his helpless brain. Solvent gushed out and Rod adjusted the pressure a bit lower.

"And then we'll just soak it a little bit," Rodimus said. He shoved the head of the sprayer past Drift's valve rim and into his valve. The rim, still fairly elastic, closed around the neck of the sprayer and formed a seal.

Solvent flooded Drift's valve, filling it in a few seconds. Then the fluid pressure started pushing on the sprayer, solvent trying to find an escape as the mesh of his valve began to stretch around it. Rodimus watched in rapt silence. The flow of solvent kept pouring in, stretching his valve in a massive, omnidirectional pressure. Rodimus laid a reverent hand over Drift's groin, feeling the plating distort around the fullness of it. Drift's valve ground up against the back of his ceiling node, sending sparks up through his frame.

Rodimus flicked the spray off and pushed down on Drift's external node, pushing him straight into overload. His valve fluttered helplessly around the incompressible liquid and his node screamed at the unrelenting force of Rodimus's hand. "I'd love to do this all day," Rodimus said. "Just see how many false overloads I could trigger in a row." He lifted his hand away and Drift's frame fell back to the berth.

Rodimus got up and walked back to the wall, leaving the sprayer affixed in Drift's valve. "You look good like that, Doll," Rodimus said.

The sprayer he walked back with had a scrubber attachment on the end. Rod powered it up in a puff of foam, scrubbers rotating around each other. He sat down on the bench, lifting Drift's upper body to lay on his lap. Then he began scrubbing down Drift's frame, working from the top down. Foam tumbled off Drift's frame in clouds as Rod attacked the creases and the transformation seams where grease and dried fluids had been accumulating. It would have felt heavenly, if not for the constant pressure on his valve driving him to distraction. Rodimus seemed to have forgotten it, running his scrubber over Drift's crotch with equal pressure as he'd used on the rest of Drift's abdomen. He let it rest directly over Drift's node, buffeted by the three scrubbers in a oversensitive haze of punishment. He left it there until Drift fell into another overload. Rodimus chuckled and finally moved the scrubber to wash down Drift's legs.

Eventually he finished Drift's frame. _Okay. Now remove the fraggin hose from my valve you fragger,_ Drift snarled as Rodimus sauntered back over to the wall to put the scrubbing attachment away.

Instead, Rodimus returned with another sprayer, this one attached to a thin, flexible tube. "I figure you've probably got a lot of transfluid collected up in here," he said, rubbing at Drift's abdomen. "That's not very sanitary, is it? We should flush that out and sanitize you, just to keep you up to Ultra Magnus standards." He threw his leg over the bench, sitting down on Drift's abdomen. With a easy hand, he nudged Drift's mouth open and maneuvered the tube past Drift's frozen glossa. Then he started feeding it down his intake.

When he ran out of tubing, he flicked the switch on the sprayer, sending a flow of blue liquid down the hose. Drift couldn't feel it as it flowed down the tube in his intake, couldn't feel it until it hit his fuel tank and _burned_. "Standard sanitizing solution," Rodimus said. "Should dislodge anything crusted up down there."

As a former racing model, Drift's fuel tank was fairly expandable. The burning liquid Rod was hosing into his tank was incompressible. Hence, it only took a few minutes before the pressure of it was distending his tank and then his frame, raising up beneath Rodimus's aft. "Ooh, getting full, are we?" Rodimus cooed, rubbing at Drift's abdomen as it bulged beneath him. Drift snarled in his head. But Rodimus turned off the spray and began to extract the hose, drawing it back out of Drift's intake. Trying to escape his fuel tank, the cleanser rushed upwards to fill his intake and mouth. As it went, it set them on fire as well, his entire insides cramping and stinging. Rodimus clamped a hand over his mouth before too much of it could escape, some leaking out beneath his fingers.

"Okay. Figure, leave that for ten minutes or so," Rodimus said. He reached down and came up with a roll of tape in his hand, winding it around Drift's helm several times until it held against the water pressure. He got up and walked out, grabbing a towel off the rack to dry himself off as he went. He flicked the lights on his way out.

Drift lasted maybe another minute before the pain and the pressure overwhelmed him into another overload. _Not your fault. He trained you to be sensitive. You don't need to feel ashamed_. That didn't help the energon flooding his face as he sparked bright enough to illuminate the room. His tremors knocked him off the bench. He fell in a tangle of limbs face-first, putting even more weight on his distended valve and fuel tank. He lay there, twitching, in agony, until Rodimus wandered back in.

"Doll!" Rodimus said as he flicked the lights on. "Geez, they really built you for fragging, huh. Oversensitive, much?" _I'd like to see you with ten gallons of fluid pumped in you. See how 'oversensitve' you get._

Rodimus pulled Drift to his knees, then pushed his face down towards the floor. "Let's get you drained out, huh?" Rodimus said. Casually, he twisted the sprayer lodged in Drift's valve. He yanked it free, loosing a flood of solvent. Rodimus blotted around his valve with a drying cloth. He discarded that cloth and then came up with a dry one, which he bunched up and began pushing into Drift's valve. _He's not going to...he's not really going to..._ With a arm bracing Drift's legs, Rodimus began squeezing his hand inside.

"Valve too stretched to play with, but at least it makes for easy cleanup," Rodimus said as his knuckles popped past the valve rim and he began the easy slide of the back of the hand. Drift could have screamed in fury. Rodimus got his hand seated up to the wrist and then began swiping around the oversensitized, bruised mesh of Drift's valve with his rough towel. He hummed a little song as he worked, rubbing at the aching mech in smooth circular strokes. Eventually he deemed him 'dry enough' and pulled his fist back out, clutching the sodden cloth.

"Halfway there," Rodimus said, patting Drift on the aft before sliding his paneling closed behind him. It was a tight fit with Drift's node and valve lips so swollen, but Rodimus didn't seem to notice. It clicked in place and he moved to kneel by Drift's head where it was pressed to the floor. He unwound the tape and tossed it away, freeing the stinging solvent. The path from tank to intake to mouth was downhill in this pose and a gush of liquid poured free. Mainly cleaning solution, a little bit of unprocessed transfluid that had been left in the bottom of Drift's tank. Rodimus kneaded at Drift's sensitive abdomen, trying to push the rest of the fluid out of his tank. Emptied to his satisfaction, he sat Drift back on the bench and began hosing off the floor. He gave Drift a brief hose-down, for the sake of thoroughness. Then he brought a pair of towels over and began buffing Drift's frame dry.

"Good as new," Rodimus said, stepping back to admire his handiwork. "Better than new even."

He scooped Drift up in his arms and carried him back to the berthroom. "Can't wait to dirty you back up, Doll."


	7. waking up

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> more experimenting - a split perspective chapter. first half is rodimus, second half is drift

Rodimus awoke slowly, no alarms going off. _That was a first._ He checked his chrono and found that he had nearly an hour before he actually had to be up. _Nice_. The energon feed wasn't cycling anymore, so he unplugged it and the neuroconnector. Lazily he let himself bask in the time to relax in the morning, nearly turning his optics back off and rolling over to sleep.

Then a particularly strong suckle reminded him what had woken himself up in the first place.

Rod propped himself up on his elbows, looking down at his fragtoy. It was where he'd left it the night before, curled over his legs. Mouth still stretched around his spike. Glossa still laving and suckling at it in sleepy, loving strokes. Rodimus pushed himself to sit up a bit and admire his toy.

He hadn't been so sure about it at first. But more and more, he was pretty sure this fragtoy was the only thing keeping him sane. The only thing he could talk to. The only place he got affection, however fake it may have been. The only place he could let out his frustrations without it hurting the crew. And it was just so breathtaking. He wasn't exaggerating when he got on a roll and starting blathering on to the thing about how beautiful it was - it was exquisite.

He petted aimlessly at it's helm, stroking over those finials. Then he moved onto its neck, running greedy hands over those fine cables. Then down its curved spine to that perfect aft. He really wished he hadn't thought up that fantasy about Magnus the other day. It had been haunting him in every meeting ever since. Spanking the thing just seemed cruel - it wasn't like it did anything wrong. It couldn't do anything wrong. It was just a pair of holes and a gorgeously programmed glossa. But he'd love to see that aft all colored up, wobbling after a nice hard slap. Sue him, he was a bit kinky. And there were so many dark rabbit holes his mind ran down that he'd never wanted to explore with an actual partner.

His spike throbbed, coming from a soft and sleepy state back to full wakefullness. He rolled his hips against the doll's face, bringing his hands back up to the back of its helm.

_Imaging waking a real partner up like this. They fell asleep on my spike, letting it go soft in their mouth. But they're so devoted that even in their sleep, they just can't stop attending to me. I start out real slow and they wake up a little bit. Their glossa gets more eager, more inventive._

He rolled his hips into the toy's face, imagining. Imagining someone flickering their optics on sleepily, then making knowing eye contact with Rodimus. Giving him a wink of their optics to let him know they were onto his game.

He kept it slow and sensuous for a few minutes. Stroking at its helm like a lover, gently petting its spine. His spike shivered in anticipation, demanding more.

"Well, I guess you're waking up now, darling," Rodimus said. With a single stroke he pushed his spike all the way down into that quivering intake, always so tight and perfect around him. Grasping its head between his hands, he pulled it up until only the tip remained between those two rows of teeth. He bucked his hips back up into that spikesleeve of his as he slammed it down, starting a ragged rhythm that had his fans instantly on high. So close already.

 

* * *

 

 

Drift stood beside Rodimus, a hand on his shoulder. They looked out over their crew, jubilant below them. There was someone standing behind, and Drift didn't need to turn his head to know that it was Primus. "I told you that you could do it," he said to Rodimus, grinning. "This ship, this crew, you as captain. That's all we needed to do the impossible."

"Do not discount the value of your faith," Primus said. "It is by my guidance and your acceptance of that guidance that you have been able to guide the crew to the Knights."

A sickening haze fell over the crowd. Rodimus looked over at Drift, eyes flashing with panic. "What's happening? Drift?"

Primus wrapped his arm around Drift, but that wasn't Primus. He knew that hand. Drift turned his head to see Turmoil looming over his shoulder. A single orange optic narrowed in delight as Drift tried to flinch away. The arm not holding Drift still had been replaced with a canon, which he raised up to Drift's face. Behind him, Rodimus begged to know what was going on, as if he couldn't see with his own optics. The rest of the room seemed to have fallen away. Replaced with darkness and Drift and Turmoil.

"Swallow it," Turmoil said, bumping the rim of his canon up against Drift's lips.

It was impossible. The canon was literally wider than Drift's head. But he didn't bother to argue. He just opened his mouth as wide as it could go and let Turmoil push inside him. Rodimus screamed.

The barrel of the canon was hot enough to boil energon and it burned Drift's throat as it pushed inside, splitting him open as Turmoil laughed.

Drift snapped awake. There was something red hot in his throat. But he recognized those hands, the shape of that spike. It was only Rodimus. Sometimes he ran hot when he overloaded. Nothing to worry about. The burns would heal in a few hours.

He must have fallen asleep at some point. The last thing he remembered was lulling Rod to sleep as he suckled at his spike. Curled up around Rod's spike wasn't the most comfortable way to sleep, but he'd managed worse.

With a shout, Rod rolled over to pin Drift beneath him, hammering home with his newfound leverage. _I'd give him a minute, tops._ Drift let himself disassociate, worrying at the dream he'd been roused from. Why were all his dreams so convinced that he and Rodimus were going to find the Knights of Cybertron? The Turmoil stuff, those were just reruns of old nightmares. But the Knights of Cybertron were new material and thus interesting to chew over. What if Primus were real? What if he had placed Drift on this starship, not by chance and misfortune, but in aid of a holy mission? Drift wished he'd spent more time listening to those religious bots he'd been sent to execute as Deadlock. Maybe they'd been onto something. _Or maybe you're trapped inside your body which is trapped in a living nightmare and you're losing your grip on reality_.

Could go either way.


	8. hedonia

"Ugh. Whirl knows I hate hats," Rodimus said as he sauntered into the habsuite. He was carrying a oversized captain's hat in one hand, a large metal trunk balanced on his other shoulder. He tossed the hat in Drift's direction, catching it on one of his finials. "Almost!" Rod said, pumping his fist and nearly unbalancing the trunk he was carrying. He stopped to set it on the ground with an audible thunk. Then he wandered over to the berth, settling the hat on Drift's head properly.

"Mm, can't even be mad, though," Rodimus said, flopping down on the berth. "Went down to Hedonia and did some _shopping_. And I found two nice Randilarians willing to frag the living daylights out of me, so that was nice. Mm. And we got some missiles for clearing asteroid fields. A good day all around," Rodimus said. He patted around the berth till his arms found Drift and wrapped themselves around him like an electroleech. "And now it's time to recharge. G'night, Doll."

He was out like a light. Drift tried to puzzle how he could possibly feel both _jealous_ at the thought of Rodimus hooking up with random mechanoids while still being terrified of whatever Rodimus had in that trunk.

 

* * *

 

He awoke to the slow slide of a warm spike in his valve. His mesh hugged the spike as it thrust in, though it was too small to even brush against his overstretched calipers. His optics were on, but Rodimus had him turned over onto his stomach, so there wasn't anything to see. The spike slid in languid strokes, then settled in, deep against his ceiling node.

Rodimus got up off the berth and walking a few steps away, leaving the false-spike in his valve. _Of course. That Hedonia shopping trip. Well, this is tamer than I would have expected._ Rodimus walked back to the berth and settled in behind Drift.

"Your valve is so loose and your rim is so tight," Rod muttered, running his fingers around the intersection of spike and valve rim. "Just gotta make things tricky for me." He hooked his finger in and stretched Drift's valve open wider. Just enough to slip in two fingers, then three. Then he pulled Drift's valve gaping wide and pressed the head of his spike against the gap.

Once he'd slipped past the rim, settled smoothly in place. The stretch against his mesh was stronger now, but still nothing compared to Turmoil. He could feel Rod's spike brushing lightly against his calipers as he rolled against the false spike already seated in his valve. His valve rim burned a little, but there was no danger of tearing.

"Damn, still nothing. Whoever was using you last must have been a fricken monster," Rodimus groaned, pulling Drift's hips up to seat himself fully in his valve. Rod pulled free and let Drift's valve snap back around the false spike. "Okay," Rodimus said. "We'll level up."

A new spikehead pressed against the rim of Drift's valve. Rodimus pushed it past the rim with a impatient pop, freeing a dribble of lubricant as it went. This one had to be at least twice the size of Rod's spike. It rubbed against Drift's internal node network as it pushed into the back of his calipers. They sparked in surprise, trying to squeeze as the false spike in mistimed clenches.

Rod ran his fingers around Drift's overstretched valve rim, dipping his finger into the gaps between the twin spikes sticking out of him. "That's gotta be enough, right?" He said.

He pulled Drift back onto his knees, raising his aft up in the air. The he slid his finger from the gap on the left side of Drift's valve to the right side, pushing the two spikes apart. Rodimus levered them apart, opening up a gap in Drift's valve to slide his inside. He jolted inside in a series of unsteady pushes, the two spikes rolling around his as he went. He moved his hands to Drift's thighs, gripping them with denting strength as he forced his way inside.

Drift's calipers clenched spasmodically. His mech stretched thin, the pressure on his internal nodes ramped up in time with the pain. His mesh shivered with the strain and he could feel Rod's spike twitching in response.

"Now that's quite a sight," Rodimus said, marveling. "You couldn't be fuller, Doll. Your rim is stretched right to the breaking point. And with those spikes sticking out of you? You look _obscene_." He rolled his hips against him, digging his face into the berth. "Feel them calipers working. I knew they just needed a little encouragement."

Rod pulled out again, leaving just the head inside. Then he slammed home and started up a punishing rhythm, knocking Drift's face against the berth as he pushed him forwards. With one hand he reached for the huge false spike and began thrusting it in counterpoint, throwing Drift's processor completely out of reality. Overwhelmed with sensation, he lay there and let Rod thrust his way to completion, barely aware of anything except pressure and the overstretched pain at his valve.

Rod drew out and rolled Drift over onto his back, leaving those spikes still in side him. Rodimus cooed with pleasure, running his hand over Drift's plating where the false spike was poking up and pushing at his plating. "Gorgeous." Rodimus said. "Lessee, next up..." He swung his legs off the berth, staggering a little as he wandered over to the open trunk. "Oh, yeah. This beauty," he said, lifting up an improbably sized false spike. Drift's spark seized. _You fragging moron. If you try and fit that in my valve you are gonig to be very fucking-_

Rod placed the spike's base against the smooth plating where Drift's spike used to be. It snapped on, magnets adhering and tugging at Drift's internals. Rodimus chuckled, probably at the ridiculous size difference between the spike and Drift's frame. It was also gold colored, which was very much not a match for Drift's frame. It looked, on the whole, absurd.

Rodimus swung his leg over Drift's hips, placing his valve right over the head of the monster spike. His spike was still out and it jerked in anticipation as Rod ground his valve against the spike head. He grinned at Drift and then began to writhe, lowering himself onto the spike in sensuous rolls of his hips, squatting deeper and deeper over the spike. He stopped halfway down, thighs trembling. "Woah," he said, planting his hands on Drift's chest to help hold himself up. "Woah. Bigger than it looked."

He scrabbled at Drift's chest, pushing himself up off the spike a bit. Then he began his descent again, lubricant flowing freely out of his valve, down the sides of the spike and pooling on Drift's abdomen. Drift's valve clenched sympathetically as he watched Rod pant, grinding his way against the spike as it forced his legs wide. Then one of Rod's feet slipped in the fluids puddled on the berth. It slid out from under him, slamming him down on the spike.

Rod cried out, falling into an overload that rattled Drift's frame. Rod gasped and whined, trying to lift himself pack off the spike, limbs too gone from overload to support his weight. As he rocked against the spike the magnets within it pulled against Drift's node network, pulling him over as well.

Rodimus recovered first, pushing himself back up to sit on the spike. He looked down on Drift's shivering form and said, "We haven't even gotten to the good part yet."

He thumbed a switch on the controller he'd held hidden in his hand. The spike began to pulsate with vibrations. Rodimus moaned in pleasure.

 _Frag it. Nevermind. I wish Rod_ was _a sadist, because this is definitely the only worse option. A maniac with a sex addiction and no sense of self preservation. If you blow your circuits, Rod, you're just going to be stuck here because there's nothing I can do about it.  
_


	9. lights out

Rodimus sat back on his heels and admired the sight. His toy sure did look pretty in cuffs. A spreader to keep its knees open, legs drawn up and over its head. Its spine curled, magnetic spike suspended directly above those soft lips. Valve pointing up at the ceiling, dripping with Rod's oral solvent and its own lubricant. He stroked over the back of the toy's legs, watching its valve spasm, vibrator still buzzing away somewhere deep in that valve. He'd set out that night to see how many false overloads he could trigger in one night, but maybe there wasn't a limit. His doll was so deliciously _sensitive_.

Rod licked over the nub of its node, feeling it quiver under his glossa. Maybe just propagating vibrations, but it was probably a sign it was getting close again. Rod sealed his lips over its node, flicking the tip of his glossa at it. Face deep in the doll's valve he could feel the overload build and break, cresting under him in a cascade of shivering sparks. They played across Rod's lips, tingling.

He sat up, grinning. "Twelve. Damn, doll." He gave it a gentle slap on it's exposed aft.

But his glossa _was_ starting to get tired. Rod looked over his setup and grabbed his new favorite toy. A spike sleeve to give him a little more girth, just so he could enjoy Doll's valve. It had external sensors that propagated down his spike, nearly a seamless sensory experience. And it made him look massive. Which was, really, just a side benefit.

He lined himself up and gave Doll's hips a little push. That false spike he'd strapped on dipped down to nudge against its lips. Rod pushed a little more, bending his toy into further contortions. The false spike slid into its eager mouth. Rod's fans revved at the sight. Most mechs weren't flexible enough to make 'go frag yourself' a credible threat. _This was..._ He jerked his spike, thick in its housing, into Doll's plush valve, knocking Doll's spike further into its mouth.

"Found out how I can frag you from both ends at once," Rodimus panted, his spike squeezed impossibly tight and caught in the vibrations form that toy he'd dropped in Doll's valve earlier. His hips stuttered, head craned to the side so he could see Doll giving itself a suckjob. It was _obscene_. It was _gorgeous_. Revving a bit higher, Rod fragged that valve as best he could given the awkward angle and the tight fit. He scrabbled at the back of Doll's legs, scratching at that perfect paint job. The sensation on his spike was just so intense, between the vibrations and the smooth slide. He picked up his pace, pounding Doll into the berth. Slamming that false spike hom into those puffy lips. The cuffs holding Doll's legs creaked, but held.

Rod knew he was going to tumble soon, but he wasn't feeling Doll tighten under him. He wanted them to overload together. So Rod scooped up another one of his vibrators and keyed it to high, feeling the little thing trying to shake its way out of his hand. Trying to keep his rhythm as the pressure mounted inside him, he slapped his hand with the vibrator over Doll's nub and pushed.

It lasted about half a nanoklik before the doll's bady snapped with charge, contorting so sharply that the cuff on its one leg pulled loose from the wall. Its valve convulsed around his spike and Rod tumbled, optics whiting out for a moment as he collapsed onto Doll.

"Frag," he said, pulling himself free and rolling to his knees. He could barely speak he was venting so hard. He fumbled at the spike sleeve and slipped it off, letting it fall somewhere on the floor. He'd deal with that _later_. Optics glazed, he looked over at his toy.

The energon froze in his lines. Doll was still suspended, curled over itself, toy still lodged in its intake. He could still hear the vibrating coming from within its valve. But its optics had shut down.

Rod let down the suspension with shaking hands, uncurling the doll and laying it flat on the berth. He tried flipping the switch a few times, but there was no lights. Frag it, had he killed the battery? It's not like the thing had come with a _manual_. He'd assumed that the battery charged via charge swapping during overload. But maybe that wasn't enough. Maybe you were supposed to plug it in at night? Mind elsewhere, he turned off the vibrators and extracted the one from deep in Doll's valve. No contractions around his hand, even though Doll's valve had always been so easily coaxed into response. Something was _wrong_.

He cleaned up the room, put away all the toys. He sealed up the toychest and admitted to himself that he was going to need help. He walked over to his comm and keyed up Ratchet.

"What?" Ratchet said.

"Could you come down to my habsuite? I need a bit of...medical assistance."

"...Rodimus, with all due respect, you can come down to the Medibay just like everyone else. Being captain gets you _privileges_ but it doesn't get you _house calls_."

"No, I know, I just...look, it's a very embarrassing medical problem, okay? I can't just walk over there."

"Uh-huh," Ratchet said, "Sure. Care to elaborate in any way? Because, right now, my answer is no."

Rodimus put down the comm and paced a bit. He could live without Doll, like, really. He could. If this was the end of the road, that was okay, he'd sort himself out. "Magnus got me a sex doll and I broke it," he said.

There was a moment of silence and then Ratchet burst out laughing. The laughing continued for a number of minutes, punctuated by occasional wheezing attempts to start some sort of a response. Eventually Ratchet got himself back under control enough to say, "And you want me to fix your sex doll? That you broke by _sexing_ too hard?"

"Yes?" Rodimus said, scratching the back of his head. "It's very person shaped."

"Pffft." Ratchet starting laughing again. "Okay, I'm on my way. No promises. I am mostly coming to laugh at you. My ETA's about ten minutes, make sure you're decent by the time I get there. There's some things I'm looking forward to _never_ ever seeing."


	10. enter Ratchet

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> aaaaaand we're switching perspectives again! Sorry about that, I tried writing this from Rod's perspective and it didn't work.
> 
> Some people were hoping for more of a righteous revenge Ratchet than ended up happening...in his defence, he's kinda busy saving someone's life in here.

Ratchet breezed in through the door. “Okay, I am ready to laugh at you,” he said with a grin. Then he caught sight of the body on the berth. “Rodimus, who the Pit is that? That's a person.”

Rodimus waved him over from his seat by the berth. “No it isn't. Apparently the Cons used droids that _look_ like normal bots for...anyway, it got confiscated and Magnus snagged it for me.”

Ratchet knelt down by the berth, snapping open his hipcase to fetch out the medical scanner. The signal was faint, but unmistakable. He started unbuckling the chest plate, trying to decipher the readings he was getting. “Rodimus,” he said, “There's a spark signature. This _is_ a person.”

Rodimus started babbling, something about there being no way and Magnus giving them to him and how the mech didn't move, he didn't do anything so how could he be a real mech? Ratchet ignored him, setting the chestplate aside and raising his scope over the mech's spark. A deep slot was carved out of the spark casing, so they must have been a Decepticon before he'd ended up like this. His spark glinted within its casing, glowing feebly. A shadow fell across the viewer and Ratchet frowned in confusion. He waved the viewer over the spark again and saw the same shadow. Setting it aside, he squinted and sighted through the hole in the spark casing. Something inside squirmed.

He slapped his comm and called First Aid. “I've got a patient inbound, prepare me a slab. We've got a foreign body lodged inside the spark casing. Call Ambulon and have him meet us there, I need all hands on deck. Patient offline due to long-term starvation, we've got the beginnings of frame cannibalism.”

“Who-”

“Stowaway, identity unknown,” Ratchet cut him off. “Priority is removal of the foreign body, I'll get him pumped up with synergine and an emergency boost before we get there.” His hands were already moving to do that as he continued to direct First Aid in the prep he was going to need for the patient. The synergine went in easy, but a fuel booster would sit heavy in the patient's tank, what with the level of tank shrinkage. Ratchet snapped his fingers at Rodimus, silencing him.

“Rodimus, focus. You can freak out later, the focus right now is saving his life. We've got a critical spark shrinkage here, mostly due to starvation. Have you been fueling him at all?”

Rodimus covered his face with his hands. “I didn't know-”

“Okay,” Ratchet said, pulling out a transfer tube. “I need access to your main fuel port, he needs a transfusion before I can move him safely. I'd make the donation myself, but I need to be doing surgery in a few minutes.”

Rodimus uncovered his fuel port with shaking hands and Ratchet clicked the cable in place on Rod's end and then the patient's. After a moment the siphon filled with pink active energon. Ratchet kept his viewer out to monitor the situation. “Has he at least been getting regular transfluid donations?” He asked.

Rodimus blushed and Ratchet rolled his eyes. “I need to know this kind of stuff before I can operate, I'm going in blind here, Rodimus. Do you know why that question matters?”

Rodimus shook his head.

“Okay. Transfluid is partially processed energon, so it would have been capable of keeping an inactive, partially paralyzed mech alive for a while. But it's got a much higher mineral count than normal energon, so a pure transfluid diet tends to lead to fuel line blockages. Clearly you haven't been donating enough _lately_ to keep this guy online, but do I need to be monitoring for fuel line clots?”

Rodimus nodded before covering his face in his hands. Ratchet snapped open a second medviewer to keep an eye on Rodimus. Active energon donations could be fairly traumatic and Rodimus was already distressed. Not that Ratchet didn't intend on dealing with him _and_ Magnus the moment his patient was out of surgery, but he needed Rodimus _alive_ for that to happen.

“Okay, I now I need to know everything you've done to him that might impact his medical record in any way,” Ratchet said. “I understand that you're freaked out, but this is important. I assume sparkplay is off the table, since you didn't know he _had_ a spark. Am I safe in assuming you engaged in penetrative sex in both possible configurations? Was there any tearing, swelling or unusually warm plating that you noticed?”

“Yes and no?” Rod said. “We did but I didn't notice anything weird. He doesn't have a spike, though.”

“Okay,” Ratchet said. “I'll check that once he's stabilized. Were you doing any chargeplay?”

Rodimus nodded. “Not very recently, but he has a port. No cable, though.”

“Alright. One-sided chargeplay can burn out circuits, so I'll need to check for that. You're good, Rodimus, I'm going to unhook the transfusion cable,” Ratchet said as he did so. “Now, I am going to take this patient to the medibay. I need _you_ to call Ultra Magnus. I will call Rung. They will meet you here. You three need to talk so you can process what's happened. This is a traumatic surprise and you shouldn't be alone right now.”

Rodimus choked on a laugh, frame steaming. “You think _I'm_ traumatised? Ratchet, I _raped_ a _defenseless_ -” His hands flew to his mouth, hunching over as his tank tried to reject half-processed fuel.

Ratchet clenched down on his annoyance. _He's not trying to grandstand, Ratchet, shock is a real condition_. Stepping away from his primary patient for a moment, he initiated a group comm to Rung and Ultra Magnus. “This is Ratchet. I need both of you to proceed to the captain's habsuite right now. We've got a crisis situation here.”

“What's the situation?” Magnus asked.  
“I'm on my way,” Rung said after a moment's delay.

“Rodimus is in shock. We've just discovered that the _gift_ you gave him, Magnus, is actually a person. They're in spark decline and I need to take them to surgery right now, but I don't want to leave Rodimus alone. Rung, you'll know what to do, right?”

There was a brief delay on the line and then Magnus began spluttering incoherently. Rung said shortly, “Yes. I can handle the situation. I can be there in three minutes.”

“Thank you,” Ratchet said. Turning to Rodimus, he said, “Rodimus, I need you to stay strong for a few' more minutes. I'm going to transform into ambulance mode to get the patient to the medibay. Can you lift them into the hatch?”

Rodimus wiped a line of drool off his face and nodded grimly. He levered himself to his feet and then positioned himself to lift the patient gently, humming in distress at the discarded chestplate and the mech's now-naked spark.

“He doesn't need the chestplate right now. Modesty is rather out the window.” Ratchet checked his patient one more time, then put his supplies away and folded himself into his transformation. He swung the doors of his back bay open, ejecting the stretcher for Rod to load the patient onto. Rodimus hesitated for a moment, flinching away from touching the patient as if they might burn him. Then he swallowed and lifted, placing the patient onto the stretcher and then folding the protective guards over him without Ratchet having to ask. He loaded the stretcher back into the back of Ratchet's bay, still shaking. Ratchet checked his chronometer against Rung's anticipated ETA.

“Ratchet, how can he be starving,” Rodimus asked plaintively. “His frame was so bright.”

“Luminescent paint,” Ratchet said. “Covers up the grey. Not that uncommon with addicts who don't want their friends to know how bad things have gotten. Probably put on this bot specifically so people like you wouldn't ask questions. Rodimus, Rung is going to be here in a minute. What I need you to do now is go to your washracks and turn on the sprayer as cold as it goes. Sit on the bench and try to cool yourself off, because you're overheating. Okay?”

Rodimus nodded. Ratchet wasn't sure he would actually do that by himself, but he needed to get his patient to surgery and Rung and Magnus would be there momentarily. He keyed the door remotely and took off, putting on his flashers to clear the hallway. His internal readouts filled with vitals on the patient and his flickering spark. His vision clouded with rage. _How dare anyone..._ he skidded a corner and accelerated a straight stretch, comming First Aid again to let him know they were on their way.

First Aid and Ambulon were waiting for him when he braked to a halt in the medibay. They unloaded the patient wordlessly and lifted him to the operating slab as Ratchet transformed back into root.

“Who is is the patient?” First Aid asked as Ratchet circled the berth, hooking up lines to get the patient on life support.

“Unknown stowaway. Got reason to believe he's a ex-Con who's been deliberately paralyzed and then tortured. Method and duration of torture unknown, but definitely included various forms of sexual assault. I want this case handled with the utmost discretion. I want the surgical suite locked down. Any patients come in, Ambulon handles them _outside_ in the main medibay.”

“Yes sir,” Ambulon said, stepping up to the berth to assist. “Where do you want us?”

“Monitoring vitals and stabilizing the patient while I perform the extraction,” Ratchet said with a sigh. Any sort of spark surgery carried with it certain risks, often unacceptably high. Extracting a foreign object from a living bot's spark was something he'd done a handful of times, with a nearly fifty-fifty survival rate. Likely Ambulon and First Aid had never done anything of the sort. “You keep him alive, I'll get what's killing him,” he said, forcing his mind to clear. He couldn't shake a micrometer. It had to go perfectly. _Whatever the frag he's done, nobody deserves this. We'll fix him and we'll make it right. You can do this, Ratchet._

 

* * *

 

Ratchet lifted the creature between two tweezer adapters and dropped it into the containment tube First Aid held out to him. He checked the readings again. _Finally stable._ They'd nearly lost him twice there during the extraction, but it was finally done.

“What is it?” Ambulon asked. “An electro-leech?”

Ratchet shook his head. “The body's the wrong shape. It could be related, but it's not a normal electro-leech. Definitely using the same sort of field cloaking, though.” Most objects, if you dropped them inside a spark, would disrupt the spark and cause it to fail immediately. Electro-leeches and other parasites had learned to conduct spark energy and resonate with the spark such that they were invisible to the spark itself, in order to feed off the spark.

“The patient is stabilizing,” First Aid said, “Full body scan complete. Spark signature finally reading...Ratchet, I need you to see this.”

 

* * *

 

Ratchet retreated to the washracks off the surgical suite and cleaned himself off, removing the sprays and splatters of energon. Then he sat down and began disinfecting all the attachments in his hands so they couldn't grime up the interiors. He sighed, weariness sunk strut deep. _Kid, how many people had to fail you for you to end up like this?_ Toweling himself off, Ratchet stood up and returned to the surgical suite.

First Aid and Ambulon were still cleaning up the berth, wiping it down so they'd be prepared for their next emergency, taking stock of what supplies had to be replenished. Drift had been moved to a recovery berth, a modesty tarp tented over his body from the neck down to cover his exposed internals. Ratchet adjusted the tarp slightly so the lines fed out of from under it more comfortably, then shifted Drift's arms to rest on top of the sheeting. He eyed the door.

“They're waiting,” Ambulon said.

“I know,” Ratchet said. He picked up a datapad in one hand as he strode out into the main of the medibay, where Rodimus and Magnus were sitting and waiting. Rung had gone back to his office, which was nice. _He'd get tetchy at me for what I'm about to_ _say_ _._

Stomping over to them, Ratchet barked, “You two slagheads. Do you have any idea how long it takes to check for a spark signature? Fifteen seconds! You couldn't be spared fifteen seconds. Leaving aside the fact that _I_ wasn't informed about the harebrained scheme from the start. What if the 'Decepticon sex-toy' was actually a plot to assassinate Rodimus? It'd be pretty easy to rig a toy with a fatal virus or a electrocution trigger. Nobody thought to have me check it over?”

Magnus folded a bit, hands clasped on his lap. “I'm sorry. This is all my fault. I felt...embarrassed by Rodimus's problem and my proposed solution, so I didn't consult you.”

Rodimus rolled his eyes. “Magnus, it's not _your_ fault. You never even looked at him. It's _my_ fault and you should go ahead and arrest me already.”

Magnus frowned. “Rodimus, we talked about this. I can't arrest you when _I_ am equally culpable. And I can't arrest both of us because someone has to pilot the ship. If you feel guilty and want to stand down, we will first have to return to Cybertron-”

“Hold up there,” Ratchet said. “Nobody is confessing, arresting or stepping down without my patient's consent. If you confess to anything, there'd be a trial and then the whole truth comes out. And having a ship full of people know that he's a rescued prisoner of war is one thing. Details about his torture are _private_ and he doesn't deserve to have that bandied about the ship.”

“Has he said anything? I assume the patient is stable, since you've come out to speak with us,” Magnus said.

Ratchet sighed. “He hasn't said anything. We're keeping him in an induced stasis until he's at least partially recovered. The spark surgery site is going to be intensely painful until the spark begins to reform itself around the injury. It'd be cruel to leave a bot online through that. We've been monitoring his brainwaves and haven't detected any anomalies, so we're pretty sure he was conscious and fairly neurologally present up until he ran out of fuel to run his processor.

“We haven't been able to determine the cause of the paralysis that Rodimus reported. I thought we'd find an embedded stasis generator, but we didn't. I thought maybe someone had clipped his actuator cables, but they didn't. There's no physically obvious cause for paralysis.”

Magnus nodded. “What did you find?”

“There was plenty that needed fixing. Some of it we've delayed until he's recovered enough to give consent and handle the surgery - mainly scarring of the intake and valve region. We had to replace the majority of his fuel lines due to excess mineral buildup, as well as his fuel tank. His spike was both impacted and mutilated and we had to operate right away because the infection was beginning to spread. His vocalizer was crushed, we replaced that as well. He's in stage 2 fuel deprivation, so he'll be on life support and supplemental feeding until I say otherwise. And then there was this little bugger.” Ratchet held up the small containment cell, tiny mechanical creatures skittering around it.

Rodimus leaned away, eyes wide. “What _is_ that?”

“A parasitic electro-shrimp. First Aid did some digging. They're normally found feeding off of solar energy clusters, we couldn't find any patient records of someone having one parasitizing a spark. This one appears to have been cross-bred with an electro-leech in order to duplicate their spark shielding. We did some tests and while we're not sure of the exact purpose for its implantation...” Ratchet frowned, “It emits a high voltage pulse when it encounters certain supersonic frequencies as a defense mechanism. Implanted inside the spark, that would cause intense pain and momentary spark failure. Since we don't have any evidence of physical means to enforce his paralysis, it's possible this bugger was used as coercive training to ensure compliance.”

“What about that switch on the back of his neck?” Rodimus asked. “The one that controlled his optics?”

“It was keyed to a resistor that broke the circuit you use to light your optics. He could still see when it was turned off. As far as I can tell that was added fairly late, possibly as part of the frame rebuild and paint job that was used to trick you two into believing the charade. We removed it, obviously.”

“Do we know who he is?” Magnus asked.

Ratchet nodded. “I do. But I'm hesitant to tell you, because if you have access to his wartime records you're going to feel tempted to forget about the reintegration act and start treating him like a _Decepticon._ He's a former Decepticon, who apparently committed an offense against the cause serious enough to merit several hundred years of torture. I'd met him once before the war, back when he was just a misguided kid. His name used to be Drift. That's what we'll call him for now.”

Rodimus hugged his knees to his chest, frowning. “Ratchet, what do we _do_? I can't just have done all that to...Drift and then do _nothing_. I have to make this right.”

“Well, right now, Drift needs three things,” Ratchet said. “One, he needs a strong medical advocate and privacy. I'm taking on that role. Two, he needs whatever help we can give him to ensure his full recovery. I want to bring Chromedome and Rung into the loop, because if this is built on compliance training and coercing the brain to reprogram it's own bodily control to escape punishment...that's a bit beyond my personal scope. Thirdly? I think he deserves revenge.”

“Revenge?” Magnus said. “For a Decepticon?”

“The war is over,” Ratchet said. “And someone made you two do this. I can't punish you, because it's not _really_ your fault. Figure out who did it, give _them_ the smackdown I'm holding myself back from giving you.”


	11. flashback hell - pt 1

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You might not be here for extended flashbacks on what Turmoil did to Drift. If that's the case, you might want to hang back for a bit, we'll be getting back to the plot eventually. (I'm swamped with work right now so updates are gonna be slower, sorry)

"I thought, at first, that I would kill you," Turmoil mused. He wrapped the lead to Drift's collar around his hand, looking down on Drift's mangled form.

Drift blinked up at him, optics glazed with energon leaking from the cut on his helm. Even without the pink sheen over everything, he wouldn't have been able to see much. His vision swam in waves from the pain pulsing at the back of his head. The collar squeezing at his mangled vocoder left him unable to bend it to see the rest of his body. Luckily for him, he had an entirely gratuitous amount of pain to inform him that Turmoil had come _pretty damn close_ to doing just that. His arms and legs weren't responding to his flagging attempts to move them. He had a sickening suspicion that when Turmoil had torn them from their sockets something had ripped. The inhibitor cuff on his left arm was no longer keeping his weapons from activating - Turmoil had taken great pleasure in rending them from his frame, the crew watching in wide-eyed silence as Drift had thrashed and screamed under his hands.

"But then, I had a better idea," Turmoil said. He ran one finger over Drift's Decepticon badge as he spoke, soothing the plating in gentle circles. "The crew ruined another fragtoy this week. Hard keeping those things in repair when you've got a couple hundred frustrated soldiers fragging them to oblivion. You betrayed _their_ trust, not just mine. It's only fair they get to share in breaking you."

Drift spat a mouthful of energon at his face.

Turmoil laughed. "I think this will be more fun, all in all. You were always a bad commander, Deadlock. Too much pride, too much passion, too little thought. And you've always been a looker. Must have been hard for your troops to resist doing something... _inappropriate_ watching you strut around like that, uppity little guttermech."

Someone in the crowd around them jeered and Drift cringed. Turmoil's face lit up when he saw it. "Breaking you is going to be too much fun." He dug his fingers in around Drift's badge, fingers bending plating and then tearing through it. Energon bubbled up around his fingers as Turmoil slowly pulled the badge free.

Drift keened, pain whiting out his optics, frame bucking to try and dislodge Turmoil.

"Sorry about that," Turmoil lied. "Only Decepticon soldiers get to wear the badge. You are no soldier." He jerked on the lead, pulling Drift off the floor by his neck. "You're a pair of holes for us to fill."

Turmoil straightened up and waved at the assembled crewmembers. "Let's go get our new toy settled in, boys."

He walked off down the hall without looking back. The lead in his hand lost its slack and then grew taut, then began to drag Drift along in his wake. The first few steps slid smoothly, lubricated by the puddle of his own leakage he'd been lying in. Then his plating began to grate against the metal, sending up sparks as he scraped along. Turmoil kept walking. The assembled crewmembers tromped along after them, leering at Drift.

Their journey ended in the main crew rec hall. Turmoil looked around and waved a few crewmembers to move some of the furniture about. They dragged one of the high benches into the center of the room. Turmoil hooked two fingers under the edge of the collar and heaved Drift onto the bench. "Cuffs," he said.

Two crewmembers stepped forward to attach Drift's arms and legs, dangling over the edge, to the legs of the bench. Drift vented in heaving gasps, fuel leakage so severe that his fuel pump was stuttering in his chest. Turmoil let go of the lead, letting it pool on the ground beside Drift's head. Then he stepped around to the other side of the bench. He stepped between Drift's knees and laid an enormous hand on his interface panel. "Open."

Drift gritted his teeth and did nothing. There was no risk of the paneling opening by itself. He barely had enough fluid pressure to keep circulating energon. If he waited it out he'd leak to death and that'd be the end of it.

Turmoil pushed against his panel, fingers teasing at the edges of it as if to repeat the performance of ripping out Drift's badge. He sighed and dropped his hand. "Someone grab a welder and patch this thing up before it offlines itself."

The first touch of the welder to live sensornet was what it took to tip Drift off the edge of consciousness.

He awoke to a cool breeze brushing up against his spark, cold against the exposed expanse he'd carved out to make his badge. Drift blinked his optics back online to Turmoil prying his chestplate open. He threw the prybar aside and pushed his hands into the space, wrenching the chestplate open. The metal squealed as it bent out of shape. Turmoil noticed Drift watching and reached down to pat him on the cheek.

"I'm told that breaking you in right now would be...risky. And I'd hate to lose our toy before we've all even gotten to play with it. So we're going to start off easy."

Turmoil stepped over the bench and sat down on Drift's midsection, straddling his body right behind his open chestplate. His face was inscrutable behind his faceplate. The crowd of voyeurs had thinned somewhat, but they were still watching with silent anticipation. Turmoil's hand fell to his own panel and freed his spike. He brought his hand around it, stroking from base to head. "Open your mouth," he ordered.

Drift bared his fangs, teeth clenched.

"You'll regret that," Turmoil said.

He tilted his body forwards, pointing the tip of his spike at Drift's open chestplate as he continued to stroke his spike. Drift's optics widened in horror and a murmur went up from the watching crowd. The scent of charge in the air tightened. Several of the spectators unsheathed their spikes as well, slack-jawed as they watched Turmoil jack his spike towards Drift's spark. Terrified, Drift let his mouth fall open. Turmoil snorted, charge beginning to dance between his hand and spike, transfluid beading at the tip. "One time offer," he said, his free hand clenching at his thigh.

Drift tried to wiggle away, pinned under Turmoil's bulk. Turmoil watched, rapacious, as Drift struggled futilely under him. He pumped at his spike faster, fans running at full blast.

With a roar, Turmoil overloaded, transfluid spurting out onto Drift's spark. The liquid hit spark and blazed, spark flaring to eject the foreign material in a blast of agony. Drift writhed, wailing.

"Let that be a lesson," Turmoil said once he'd quieted down. "Do exactly as you are told and things will be less painful. Now, keep your mouth open." He waved at the surrounding soldiers as he swung his leg off of Drift, retracting his spike. "He's all yours, boys. Mind the spark as long as he follows instructions."

The crowd pushed forwards, thronging around Drift, spikes in hand. They jostled shoulders, air thick with charge as they worked their spikes over Drift's body. Drift's head swam, heat rising around him as the first mech overloaded onto Drift's stomach with a moan. Someone shoved that bot back to claim his space. The next to come painted Drift's face in transfluid, splashing some of it over his optics. Someone jeered as Drift tried to blink it away, shifting helplessly against his bonds. That seemed to set off the cascade, bots overloading one after another, coating Drift till he was dripping. A few stray droplets landed and combusted against his spark, but most of the attention was focused around his face and lower body, striping across his tongue and lips and blurring his vision beyond recognition. Someone ran a hand through the mess on his abdomen, laughing as they spread it over him. He could still hear mechs beating their spikes over his face, and waited in helpless anticipation.

Faceless hands rubbed at his plating, working the puddle of transfluid over his arms and legs and panel in what must have been an obscene tableau. Drift cringed away from their hands but kept his jaw open wide, spark still bared to the crowd. Everything was hazy except the pain and the fear coiled in his spark.

Eventually they finished. Dirft had no idea how many there were or how long it had been, only that he was soaked to the struts, transfluid pooling and puddling around him. His glossa was coated in bitter and he found himself unable to see at all through the muck. They stepped away from him and Drift vented a sigh of relief.

Then Turmoil stepped back over him, hands falling to Drift's throbbing shoulders. "Lesson learned, pet?" He asked. "Do as I say, suffer less. It is your only option. I ask only for complete obedience." He turned to someone beside him. "Turn it over."

Someone moved to the cuffs at his wrists and ankles and Drift would have struggled if there was any struggle left in him. They flipped him over like a doll, recuffing him splayed on his stomach, laying in the mess they'd made. Drift shuddered with the effort of keeping his chest slightly raised to hold his bared spark up above the surface of the bench.

Turmoil moved behind him, rubbing his hands over Drift's aft with a possessive intensity. "Laser scalpel," he barked.

He began to carve into the plating of Drift's aft, white-hot lines of pain that it took Drift a few minutes of choked-back keening to recognize as letters. _Property of Turmoil. For public use._ He set the scalpel aside, chuckling as Drift continued to pant, venting in desperate gasps.

"So you remember," he said softly, running his hands over the burning letters and squeezing. He released Drift and stepped back. There was no warning before the first slap, piercing, landed across Drift's aft. The letters lit up like hellfire and Drift squealed, pain driving him beyond dignity. Turmoil seemed to enjoy his response, striking him a few more times across the aft before pressing the again-hard tip of his spike to his aft and jacking it over the letters. Drift warbled in fear and Turmoil groaned in anticipation, speeding up. He spilled over Drift's aft and onto his back in a gush of liquid, burning at the letters carved into him.

"Remember boys, I get to break it first and the doctor says three days rest," Turmoil said. "But feel free to pretty it up. Got a lot of clean plating on the backside here."

He walked away and most of the others followed him. The lights in the rec room switched off as the motion sensor detected no people moving about. Drift's chest heaved, spinal strut trembling as he held his spark up off the puddle beneath him.

This wasn't the Turmoil he knew. The Turmoil he knew was impulsive and quick to anger. He had to be fighting against his nature to drag this out slow and Drift just had to wait until he fragged up and went to far _...maybe a poor word choice._

It wasn't that he'd never suspected Turmoil would turn on him. He'd always been jealous of how close Drift had been to Megatron, always insinuating something vulgur behind Drift's back to explain it. What bothered Drift was that he couldn't _remember_ what he'd done to make Turmoil flip, memories fuzzy after the blow that had fractured the back of his skull. He wouldn't give Turmoil the pleasure of his confusion - but damn if he didn't wonder what the frag he could possibly have done to turn the entire crew against him. He wondered if Megatron would learn of what had happened to him.

He hoped he'd be dead before then.


	12. Chapter 12

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> well, this has been awhile. we've got some smaller scenes covering Turmoil 'taming' Deadlock and next we'll switch over to the comfort/recovery part of the hurt/comfort. As before, if you're not into reading what happened to Drift, that's cool & you can skip this chapter.

"It's not that I don't enjoy owning your body," Turmoil said, digging his hands into Drift's hips. Drift snarled static in response, earning him a huff of laughter. Turmoil's hands played at the chains holding Drift down. "And you are very pretty in chains. But, I admit, I'm growing tired of your pathetic attempts at resistance. Just settle in and take it." He ground his spike deeper into Drift's valve to punctuate the order. Drift snarled back.

"Very well," Turmoil said. "But I _will_ tame you. And it will hurt a great deal more than if you'd just complied from the start.”

 

-

 

Turmoil watched in fascination as his toy writhed under hand. He lifted his finger from the trigger and watched Deadlock sag in relief. "If you disobey an order, any order, you will feel the taste of that pain again. Do you enjoy it?"

Deadlock stared at him, eyes dull. Turmoil tapped the trigger, watched his toy jerk against the chains as the parasite electrocuted his spark.

"If I ask a question, answer it. Do you enjoy the sensation?"

Deadlock shook his head quickly.

"That's a shame," Turmoil said, letting his hand stray down his toy's frame. He reached the a spike, permanently extended thanks to a piercing they'd driven through the base. He wandered further downwards, to the exposed nub of his doll's external node. He rolled his fingertip in a gentle circle, evoking a shiver from Deadlock. "I'm sure we can find a sensation you enjoy better. Let's begin your training. Stay perfectly still."

He unlatched the chains that held Deadlock to the bench. He stayed frozen. Turmoil sat down and patted his lap. "On your knees. Crawl."

It took Deadlock a moment to get his legs under him. But he crawled over to Turmoil best he could, chains trailing behind. Turmoil extended his spike, smoothing the build-up of fluid over his length as Deadlock watched with wide eyes. "Sit down, Deadlock," he ordered.

Deadlock crawled into his lap, legs sprawled wide over Turmoil's thighs. Turmoil reached out to take Deadlock by the waist and steady him. A plush valve rubbed over the head of his spike as Deadlock positioned himself. Venting deeply, Deadlock lined himself up and began to sink onto his spike. The pressure was delightful, freshly tightened calipers locked around his spike. But Turmoil dragged himself away from his pleasure a moment to focus on the important thing - training his toy to good behavior.

"Sit," he repeated. "Don't drag it out."

Deadlock lowered himself down faster, but that wasn't the _order_. Turmoil pressed the button. Deadlock's body seized, his spark strobing with agonized charge. Turmoil released the button. "Sit."

Deadlock vented again and dropped his body. Something tore, a trickle of hot energon running down the side of Turmoil's spike. Deadlock held himself in position, plating bulging around Turmoil's spike, shivering with tension. Turmoil ran a hand over Deadlock's spinal strut. "Soon you'll be held accountable for these movements too. But for now, good work. If you do as I say, Deadlock, I won't have to punish you. Now stay limp."

Deadlock shuddered, but kept his body still as Turmoil moved both his hands to wrap around Deadlock's middle. He was so thin. Turmoil could practically reach all the way around. Small and delicate and delicious. Turmoil squeezed and lifted Deadlock up off his spike, admiring the lax splay of his toy's legs as he did so. With a possessive snarl, he slammed Deadlock back down onto his spike. He thrust up into his spikesleeve, bouncing it on his spike at a pace that had it's arms flopping at its sides. Such a _promising_  first day of training.

 

-

 

Turmoil strode onto the bridge, jerking the lead behind him to urge his toy to crawl faster. Deadlock was nearly ready for public use, he was certain. He'd seen no sign of willful disobedience since they began use of the parasite. And his ability to control his impulses to conform to Turmoil's will was almost impressive. But Turmoil had intended to keep Deadlock within sight for at least a full year before returning him to the crew as their shared plaything. Once he was certain that Deadlock would follow any order, regardless of his _desire_  to do so.

Turmoil sat down in the captain's chair, dropping the lead as Deadlock followed to kneel by his feet.

"Down," he ordered.

Deadlock flattened himself against the floor, swollen spike trapped between his belly and the ground. He shifted his knees further apart to reveal the plug Turmoil had selected for the day. Just thin enough to leave him a little understretched for Turmoil's spike. Thick enough to keep any fluids from leaking out. Turmoil moved one foot onto the small of his back, pressing down lightly. "Move," he said.

Under orders, Deadlock began to rut against the ground, little spastic motions as his spike rubbed against the rough surface of the floor. Turmoil turned his attention away to the actual business of captaining the ship, taking reports from his various command leaders. They kept sneaking looks at his toy, silently writhing against the ground, but Turmoil refused to be distracted. "Overload, don't stop moving," he commanded Deadlock without bothering to look over.

There was a clatter and a crackle as Deadlock seized in overload at his feet. They hadn't been able to train out the frame movements that came with overload yet. Maybe it just wasn't possible. Turmoil continued working.

Eventually, when he decided he was feeling generous, he gave Deadlock the command to overload again, and to stop. He looked over his toy, still silent, frame scorching hot from pent up charge. Delicious. "Turn over." Deadlock rolled onto his back, keeping his legs splayed so Turmoil had full access to whatever he wished to touch. But Turmoil didn't especially wish to touch, just then.

With one enormous ped, he scraped his foot down the side of Deadlock's spike, already rubbed raw and swollen from fragging himself against the floor. Deadlock didn't shudder. He pressed down, pushing that spike up against Deadlock's belly and then crushing it, ever so slightly, under his ped. Deadlock didn't react, though his optics widened. Turmoil grinned beneath his faceplate.

For the time being, he went back to ignoring his toy, rubbing his foot absently back and forth over its spike as he worked.

It was nearing the end of his shift on the bridge before he decided what he wanted to do with Deadlock that day. He commed one of his pilots and asked them to bring him the necessary equipment. Then he patted his lap to get Deadlock's attention.

"Up."

Deadlock crawled into his lap and sprawled back, head against his chest as he stuck out his chest to put on a show for the crew. Turmoil amused himself for a bit by playing with the edges of his finials, crimping them this way and that and feeling the tension in Deadlock's frame as he tried to hold himself still. The pilot returned, laying the tools he'd requested on the arm on the chair.

"Now, Deadlock, I was thinking that your spike is looking awfully dull. Not that anyone is like to make use of it, but I hate to see something ugly on such a pretty fragtoy. It ruins the whole look." Turmoil picked up the rivet gun and placed the tip against the side of Deadlock's spike. "I think a few more piercings, a bit of glitz."

Deadlock held himself stock still, but Turmoil couldn't be quite sure if it was obedience or fear. With a gentle hand, he lifted one of Deadlock's hands to wrap it around the trigger. "Pull the trigger," he ordered.

Deadlock hesitated.

Turmoil rumbled in anger. Panicking, Deadlock pulled the trigger, a gush of energon spilling from the rivet piercing his spike. Turmoil tossed the gun aside and picked up the activator. "I did not tell you to hesitate," he explained before giving Deadlock an abrupt pair of shocks that sent him spilling back onto the floor. Turmoil looked down on his toy and shook his head.

"I'm sorry, toy, but you know the rules. You're going to have to _prove_ to me that you can follow orders."

He picked up the other tool the pilot had delivered; a thin but high voltage shock stick. He held it own for Deadlock to take. "Take this."

Deadlock reached out blindly to grab the shock stick, cradling it in his hands, waiting for further instruction. Turmoil let him wait for a few minutes, aware of the crew watching over his shoulder in horrified fascination. He wasn't going to offline his toy this early in the game and if he pushed too fast, Deadlock was going to collapse. Let him suffer the anticipation while his spark recentered from the shock. Turmoil wondered, idly, how painful the parasite must be, the things Deadlock was willing to do to avoid its sting. Nothing the traitor didn't deserve.

When he judged Deadlock ready Turmoil nodded and gave his next order, with a gentle reminder that Deadlock wasn't to hesitate or he'd be forced to trigger the parasite again.

Deadlock shifted the shock stick to his left hand, dropping his right to the plug sticking out of his valve. Tight, but not so tight that Deadlock couldn't work a finger in between it and his valve rim, pulling open a space for him to insert the shock stick into his valve and the liquid filling him thick. He moved his hands behind his back, as ordered. Had he wondered what the liquid was for, when Turmoil had filled him up this morning? Surely he must have wondered why Turmoil would fill him with anything besides his transfluid, always enough to have him firmly full.

Turmoil remotely triggered the shock stick and watched. Deadlock jerked and seized as the charge burned at his valve and sent sparks crackling over his frame. Turmoil kept his eyes on Deadlock's pelvic plating, catching the first hint of movement as the reactive fluid began to foam and expand in response to the added charge. Deadlock's plating creaked, buckling to fit the frothing fluid as it foamed and solidified. Deadlock overloaded again, head snapping back against the floor. Without orders, but it was his own fault for training the poor thing so be so reactive to having a nice full valve. Deadlock's pelvic plating bulged, obscene, as the charge dance and scorched at his frame. The smell of toasting wiring was rising thick in the air.

At last the pressure grew to be too much and the plug popped free. A cascade of semisolid beads flowed free, along with the still-sparking shock stick. Turmoil turned it off and stood to circle his toy, admiring the sight from all angles. "That was very good, Deadlock," he said. "If you stay good I won't have to punish you like that again."

Walking wasn't going to happen until he had the medic repair the shorted circuits. Instead he lifted Deadlock up in his arms and carried him from the bridge, comming a note to the janitorial staff to clean up the command station and a note to one of the medics that their toy was going to require maintenance. Just as soon as he _rewarded_ Deadlock for his performance.

 

-

 

It was their squad's turn, on account of them just getting back from the ground mission they'd been working. Setting and placing anti-personnel mines, always nasty work. Rugger was looking forward to getting to unwind a little bit.

But when he and the rest of the squad rolled in to the mess hall, someone already had their fragtoy under the table. _Vog_. Rugger rolled his optics and waved the rest of the boys back while he went to fetch their shareware. Vog was sitting with some friends at one of the long tables, long-finished cubes sitting empty on the table as he worked the toy on his spike under the table, jerking it this way and that using its finials as handles. Rugger stepped up to him and banged a fist on the table.

"I'm gonna need that," he said.

Vog caught his eye and shrugged. "You were late. Lemme finish, it'll just be a minute."

"You're a damned liar," one of his friends snorted. "More like thirty minutes."

"You can have it back later," Rugger said. "But my squad gets first dibs tonight. We're on the board."

Vog continued ignoring him, so Rugger reached under the table and grabbed the fragtoy by the ankle and pulled. Vog hissed in frustration and clawed at those finials for a minute, but Rugger had him outweighed and didn't especially care if the toy came with or without its finials. He got it in the end and dragged it back to their corner. "Kneel, alright?" He said to its slumped form.

"Can't," Spearhook said, "Turmoil changed the standing orders this week. Can't move anything but his mouth now." Spearhook helpfully lifted their toy into a kneeling position, which it held, face forward, optics distant. Like there was nobody inside anymore.

"Well, obviously Turmoil makes the rules," Rugger said, "but that's kinda disappointing. I liked last time when we ordered the fragtoy to ride us and act real desperate for our spikes? I mean, I'm all for docile. But poseable just isn't as immersive."

"Cool, boss." Iquit leaned over to paw at the fragtoy's valve. "You done monologuing yet? I want in."

Rugger waved him on. He'd get his fill once the rest of them were done. Rugger was...proportional. If he stretched out that valve before the rest of the boys had their fun everyone would be disappointed.

There was some jostling, but they got the toy on it's hands and knees, Inquit filling it up from behind. Spearhook took the front. Rugger let himself admire the sight. It never got old watching Deadlock, fraggin _Deadlock_ , impaled by the grunts on his team, body unresistant as they knocked him back and forth with the force of their thrusts. Turmoil had done a number on him while they'd been gone, laserwhip burns crisscrossing his legs and arms, little scours cut in around the transformation seam where Turmoil liked to dig in with a knife. His finials were crimped and one of his optics had swollen half closed. Still a pretty fucker, somehow.

Deadlock held himself loose and pliant as Spearhook swapped out with the next teammember, Inquit hammering him forward onto their spike almost before Deadlock had time to obediently open his lips. Eventually Inquit swapped out with Cudgel, and then the next team member and then the next. Rugger could almost see the bulge in Deadlock's midsection as they filled him up. He could definitely see the transfluid running down Deadlock's thighs, squelching out of his valve with each thrust.

"We should prep it for you, Rugger," Altitude said as he and Swinge swapped into places, the end of the first round.

"What are you thinking?" Swinge asked, pantomiming out a series of lewd suggestions that had the rest of the crew chuckling.

"I was thinking it could take two," Altitude said with a wink. Swinge grinned and helped Altitude pose Deadlock in a new position, sitting down on Altitude's spike, his back to Altitude's chest. Altitude wrapped his arms around Deadlock and laid back, lifting his hips a bit to give Swinge room to fit. Swinge wasn't as big as Rugger, but it was close. And with Altitude in there already, they had to be nearly as big as Turmoil together. Swinge pushed in with a groan. Deadlock, sandwiched between them, kept perfectly still, not even a shiver of his legs to indicate the strain. From their awkward positions, they couldn't get much leverage, but they tried their best, rocking up into Deadlock in short thrusts.

Rugger could feel his plating heating. He got up and wandered over, snaking a hand in between the two of them to wrap around Deadlock's spike. He rotated one of the piercings slowly, just to feel Deadlock's spike shiver in his hand. Then he let his fingers wander up to the head of the spike, studded and oversensitive.

He could have sworn Deadlock looked him in the optic for just a moment, hate burning. Then he was crashing into overload and dragging the other two with him, valve convulsing. Rugger pulled Deadlock off of them and stood up. He threw Deadlock up against the wall, using it as leverage to frag that still shivering valve within an inch of its warranty. When he finished he let Deadlock slide down the wall in a puddle of lubricants and steaming transfluid. Deadlock sat there, facing forward, no emotion visible on his face. Rugger slapped him, hand clipping the one swollen optic. Deadlock's head snapped to the side and stayed there.

Rugger laughed. "I used to worry that someday you'd snap and try and rip us limb from limb. But that's not even an option for you, is it? Turmoil's zapped all the fight out of you and now you're just what you always should have been - shareware, up for the taking." He pushed Deadlock down onto the ground, grinding his face in the puddle of transfluid. "Clean up your filth, shareware."

A red glossa poked out between swollen lips and began to obediently lap up the mess on the floor.


	13. Recovery p1

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ratchet POV again - this is a short one but we should hopefully get more soon.
> 
> much later: or not. sorry people but I think I freaked myself out so badly on chapters 11 and 12 that this work is permanently abandoned. which is probably for the best. maybe someday, but in the meantime imagine everyone gets a lot of therapy and there's some righteous revenge

It was a hard call. Ratchet hadn't wanted to make the call before Drift woke, but they were starting to attract whispers at the medibay. And when Ratchet tried to bring Drift back to consciousness on schedule, their readouts had indicated he was still in an unacceptable amount of pain. His spark wasn't recovering as fast as Ratchet had hoped. They sedated Drift again and Ratchet called Swerve in to the medibay.

"I'm not in trouble, am I Doc?" Swerve asked, casting a cautious look around the medibay, dark and empty. Ambulon had put some music on, a soft synthesizer to soothe their patient, and it drifted out into the main medibay under the door of the back room. Ratchet had pointed out that their patient was _unconscious_ , but as long as First Aid didn't get control of the stereo system he was willing to put up with it.

"You're not in trouble," Ratchet said, guiding Swerve over to his desk. "I've got a bit of a problem and I need to create some gossip before people start getting nosy."

Swerve perked up. "Is this about your mystery patient? Whirl has been on my case all week about it. He's pretty sure it's one of his apparently numerous nemeses."

Ratchet sighed. "Exactly. So, there's some things I can't tell you. And Rodimus doesn't want to just call an assembly and announce anything. But could you circulate some things to calm down the rumor mill?"

Swerve clasped his hands and set them daintily in his lap. "Circulating gossip is one of the top skills listed on my resume, Ratchet. What's the scoop?"

Ratchet gave the back room a sidelong glance. "We've got a patient. He was smuggled on board as cargo but command isn't sure who was behind it. Ex-decepticon POW."

"How do you smuggle someone as cargo?" Swerve asked.

"He's paralyzed," Ratchet said. "And unconscious. I don't want to give too many details. This is a Fort Max type situation, okay?"

"Got it. What was the goal of smuggling him on board, though?" Swerve asked.

Ratchet shrugged. "Well, he nearly starved to death. I suspect someone wanted him to die on board the Lost Light, tie up loose ends. I've got my team on it, all I need is for the crew to keep their distance while I help Drift recover."

"Drift? Not a very Decepticon name."

"And yet, it's his name. That enough to keep the rumor mill placated, you think?"

Swerve chuckled. "I don't think you can _placate_  the rumor mill. But I'll remind folks how grumpy you get when people try getting in your way with a critical patient."

 

The beeping monitor drew Ratchet to the back room and he drew up a chair by the side of the berth. The readouts looked acceptable this time, high cerebral activity, but low levels from the pain channels. He waited as Drift's optics flickered on slowly. They lit to dull blue, gaze dead ahead and not adjusting. No sign there was anyone in there if Ratchet didn't have him hooked up to three monitors assuring him Drift's brain was spinning up like a jet engine.

Ratchet scooted his chair so that he fell within Drift's field of vision. "Hey kid," he said. It was deeply tempting to reach out and pick up the kid's hand, sitting there at Drift's side. But Ratchet restrained himself. _Not till you get permission, not after what he's been through._

Drift didn't respond, but the monitors lit up like fireworks when Ratchet spoke. _He's in there. We just need to get him out_.

"Hey kid," Ratchet repeated. "Don't worry, you're safe. You're in my medibay and I'm not going to let anyone hurt you. We got that thing out of you, it can't hurt you anymore. Can you speak?"

Drift lay there, didn't twitch. _So that'd be a no._

Ratchet gave him a few minutes, waited careful for any response. Nothing. "It's okay if you can't. We'll figure this out. Is there any part of your body that you can move?"

That looked like a no as well. Ratchet was almost glad it had taken so long to get Drift back to consciousness - in that time the swelling had gone down enough that they'd been able to replace his modesty plating and remove the tarp. At least on the outside, Drift looked good as new. Nothing like he'd used to look like, but whole and shiny. Once they got Drift talking they'd be able to talk to him about what he wanted done with his frame.

"Okay, that complicates things a bit. Drift, we're probably going to need to bring in our mnemosurgeon to help you." The monitor ramped up again and the urge to take Drift's hand and reassure him was almost overwhelming. "Drift, I know that idea scares you, and I'm not going to do anything when you're scared like this. He's a good bot. He's not going to pry in your memories. He's not going to mess with you. All we need him to do is cut the behavioral triggers that are telling you that  _moving_  is a thing you're not allowed to do. But it's not happening today. Today you and me are just going to sit here and talk. Well, I guess you'll just have to listen to me. I'll get you all caught up on how the war ended..."

 

Ratchet looked up at the shuffle of footsteps as Chromedome and Rung left the room. Ratchet got to his feet and walked over, face tight with hope. "How did it go?" He asked.

Rung and Chromedome exchanged a glance. Rung smiled at Ratchet. "I think we've put him at ease. It's hard working with nonverbal patients, but his field, his readings seemed steady today. Chromedome mostly talked about Rewind."

Chromedome shrugged, a bit bashful. "You said to talk about me, make him feel comfortable. Rewind's all the good parts of me."

"I'm not joking about that appointment," Rung said. "Any time. Drop me. Just you or as a couple. I think it'd do you a lot of good."

"So are we going to do it?" Ratchet asked. He rubbed his hand against his leg anxiously. Rung had said to take it slow. They'd been taking it glacially. Nearly two weeks and they'd only shown Drift the mnemosurgery needles yesterday. Ratchet figured that the creeping boredom of being stuck in your body in a medibay would have outweighed the fear of mnemosurgery pretty quick. But, then again, Drift had been stuck like this for a long time. He'd probably learned to cope with boredom. And Rung had left some audiobooks he could play for Drift, a gentle murmuring voice by the bed telling tales of lands beyond the farthest stars. Rung was screening them for any stories with violence or war or abuse but apparently had quite the collection of strangely domestic fantasy stories.

"I think he's ready," Rung said. "I wish we could get proper consent. That's the first thing Chromedome will try for. Tomorrow. You should be there, Ratchet."

"Me?" Ratchet said. "I dunno, Rung. You and Chromedome are the brain experts."

"He's most comfortable with you," Rung said. "I don't know if you've noticed, but his stress channels settle down every time you enter the room. He trusts you and having you in the room will make him feel more safe. You should be there."


End file.
